Discussions of 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, 



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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



DISCUSSIONS 



Philosophical Subjects. 



DISCUSSIONS 



Philosophical Questions 



BY 

JOHN L. GIRARDEAU, D. D., LL. D., 

Late Professor in the Theological Seminary, 
Columbia, South Carolina. 

EDITED BY 

Rev. GEORGE A. BLACKBURN, 

Under the Auspices of the Synods of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama 
and Florida. 



fe 



RICHMOND, VA.: 
The Presbyterian Committee of Publication. 



1 



62638 



jjUifoMcry of Conferees 
UiPlifc HtCt.vti} 

OCT 18 1900 

Copyright entry 

SECOND COPY. 

Dt-iiVfci«*f to 

omm division, 
NOV 20 1900 







Copyright, 1900. 

BY 

JAMES K. HAZEN, Secretary of Publication. 



Printed by 

Whittet & Shepperson, 

Richmond, Va. 



CONTENTS. 

Page. 

Prefatory Note, 7 

Introduction", 9 

The End of Philosophy, 27 

Consciousness: With Special Reference to 

Sir William Hamilton's Views, .... 49 

The Authority of Consciousness, .... 85 

cosmothetic idealism, 97 

Berkeley's Idealism, Ill 

Objective Idealism, 156 

Pantheism, 167 

Sir William Hamilton's Doctrine of Causa- 
tion, 209 

Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge, . . 260 
The Argument for the Being of God from 

our Cognitive Nature, . 304 

Mr. Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy, . . . 357 

Physiological Psychology, 435 

Space — What is it? 496 



PREFATORY NOTE. 



The frequent references to Sir William Hamilton 
in these discussions is due to the fact that the students 
whom the writer addresses are asked to read the Lec- 
tures and Discussions of the Scottish philosopher, in con- 
nection with the delivery of his own views, orally or in 
writing, in the class-room. Hamilton's philosophy thus 
becomes, to a large extent, a point of departure for dis- 
cussions which may involve either a defence or a rebut- 
tal of its doctrines, and sometimes enter a separate and 
independent field. 



EDITOR'S PREFACE. 



Dr. Girardeau, at his death, left a small trunk full 
of unpublished manuscript, a large part of which was 
unsuited for publication, being in the form of notes for 
use in the class-room or for help in his own studies. As 
much of it as was suitable was offered by his family for 
publication to the four Synods having control of the 
Theological Seminary at Columbia, South Carolina. 
The Synods appointed a committee, investing it with 
discretionary power, to consider the proposition. The 
Rev. W. T. Hall, D. D., was appointed by the Synod 
of South Carolina ; the Rev. Thos. P. Hay, by the Synod 
of Florida ; the Rev. Donald McQueen, by the Synod of 
Alabama; and the Rev. J. T. Plunket, D. D., and 
Ruling Elder W. C. Sibley, by the Synod of Georgia. 
This committee was organized by the selection of Dr. 
Hall as chairman, the Rev. Mr. Hay as business mana- 
ger, and the Rev. Geo. A. Blackburn, representing the 
family of Dr. Girardeau, as editor. 

While every member of the committee has been zealous 
in furthering the work intrusted to it, the ability and 
persistence of the Rev. Thos. P. Hay, and the advice 



6 Editor's Preface. 

and assistance of the Rev. J. K. TIazen, D. D., Secretary 
of Publication, have been chiefly instrumental in mak- 
ing it possible to begin publication. 

These Discussions were prepared by Dr. Girardeau 
for the press ; they were found in a bundle to themselves 
marked "complete.'' He had expressed the desire that, 
in case any of his manuscript should ever be published, 
this would be the first issued. The committee, therefore, 
after examining this manuscript, decided that it should 
bo published first. This explanation is made because it 
was thought by many of the friends of the work that his 
Life and Sermons ought to have preceded this volume. 

The capitalization in the book is not that of Dr. Girar- 
deau, nor is it exactly what would have been chosen by 
the editor. It is the system of the printers, who have 
conformed to the style or fashion now adopted in the 
modern printing office, and in publishing centres. 

E"o apology is needed for offering this book as a part 
of the literature of the Presbyterian Church. For every 
system of theology must have a system of philosophy 
associated with it; and no theology will long remain 
more sound than its coordinate philosophy. Every ad- 
vance, therefore, in sound philosophy is an additional 
buttress to true theology. 

Dr. Girardeau has been recognized by the church at 
large as a great preacher; by the ministry as a great 



Editor's Preface. 7 

theologian and preacher ; and by his students as a great 
philosopher, theologian and preacher. His extensive 
library was more theological than homiletical, and more 
philosophical than theological. Probably the study in 
which he naturally took most delight was philosophy. 

As to the Discussions themselves, their main purpose 
is to advance the Scottish school of philosophy. They 
are not intended to be a system in themselves. This 
book is really a supplement to Hamilton's Metaphysics, 
in connection with which it ought to be studied. It 
seeks to correct what is considered incorrect in Hamil- 
ton ; to develop more fully his system ; and to bring it 
down to the present time — answering the objections and 
refuting the errors of opposing systems in their latest 
expressions. 

These discussions were prepared by the author in his 
mature years, some of them having been written, and all 
of them having been revised by him since 1890. They 
fairly represent, therefore, his ability, his scholarship, 
and the final conclusions of his life of study. 

The committee hope to follow this, as soon as the way 
is clear, with one volume of Theological Discussions, 
and one volume containing his Life and Sermons. 

George A. Blackburn, 
Columbia, S. C, Sept. 20, 1900. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Some things deserve to be noted as introductory to 
the discussions which follow. 

1. For the sake of clearness somewhat needs to be said 
concerning at least some of the leading terms which will 
be employed. 

Knowledge may be regarded as spontaneous or re- 
flective ; spontaneous, when it is attained without volun- 
tary effort in the unimpeded exercise of the cognitive 
powers; reflective, when the crude materials furnished 
spontaneously are by the thinking faculty reduced to 
some degree of order. ISTo merely spontaneous know- 
ledge can properly be denominated science, nor is all re- 
flective knowledge entitled to that designation. Most 
men reflect to some extent, and perhaps most men in 
some measure arrange, classify and systematize their 
knowledge. Something more is necessary to constitute 
scientific knowledge. Science is knowledge arranged, 
classified and systematized, with the end in view of 
reaching an ultimate principle of unity. Science aims 
to be a unifier of knowledge. In this view the writer is 
disposed to concur with Mr. Herbert Spencer. 

Science is, in a broad way and without an excessive 
refinement of terms, distinguishable into physical and 
metaphysical. It is only a loose, popular usage which 



10 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

contradistinguishes science to metaphysics. If it be 
possible to investigate and systematize the phenomenal 
facts of the mind with the end in view of attaining to 
unity, it is obvious that there may be a metaphysical 
science. Physical science is employed in the observa- 
tion and registry, and also the logical classification of 
the phenomenal facts of nature, including those of the 
bodily organism, but excepting those of the human mind. 
When one passes beyond this field of material phenom- 
ena, he crosses the boundary between physical and meta- 
physical science, and enters the domain of the latter. 
Metaphysical science, or, what is the same thing, mental 
or intellectual science, is concerned about the phenome- 
nal facts (including the laws as facts) of the mind, and 
the inferential judgments of the mind considered as 
noetic. 

Metaphysics, in the wide sense, and philosophy the 
writer regards as for the most part signifying the same 
thing, and distributable as generic, into psychology and 
ontology. Psychology is the science having for its ob- 
jecirmatter the facts (including the laws considered as 
facts) of the mind. Ontology is the science having for 
its object-matter the inferential judgments of the mind 
contemplated not as dianoetic — with it, logic has to do — 
but as noetic. Whether logic should be embraced as an 
instance of nomological science, in this distribution, does 
not appear to be a matter of much consequence. It is 
not usual to speak of it as metaphysical or philosophical, 
and it might, perhaps with propriety, be assigned the 
place of an independent science. Possibly this might 
be a classification preferable to that of Hamilton, who 



Inteoduction. 11 

distributes psychology into phenomenological, nomo- 
logical (including logic) and inferential. 

It is not denied that there is a philosophy of physical 
science, as Herbert Spencer claims, but it deserves to 
be remembered that such a philosophy is but the deriva- 
tion by the mind of metaphysical inferences, in the 
form of ontological, from the phenomenal facts observed 
and recorded by physical science. 

If any should object to this distribution that philoso- 
phy is wider than metaphysics, inasmuch as it em- 
braces in its scope the moral nature, while metaphysics 
does not, be it so. A broader division would then be 
of philosophy into metaphysics and moral philosophy, 
metaphysics being distributable into psychology and 
ontology. But, in strictness, psychology is, in part, con- 
cerned about the phenomenal facts of the moral nature ; 
and ontology, in part, about the inferences which are de- 
ducible from those facts ; and if we exclude moral phi- 
losophy on the ground that it is not concerned about 
the intellect proper, on the same ground we would be 
obliged to exclude the scientific consideration of the 
feelings and the will. Further, it may be replied to the 
objector that, as psychology partly deals with the phe- 
nomenal facts of the moral nature, it may come to this : 
that moral science — and by this is here meant the spe- 
cial science conversant about the moral nature, and not 
moral science more generally considered as sometimes 
contradistinguished to natural or physical science — will 
have to be reduced with logic under the head of nomol- 
ogy,as treating of the development and application of the 
laws by which our moral nature is governed. As, however, 



12 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

the writer has no disposition to be contentious about the 
use of terms, which depends so largely upon taste and 
custom, let it suffice to have indicated the senses in 
which they will be mainly employed in these discussions. 
1. It deserves remark, however, that in a narrow sense 
metaphysics coincides with ontology. In that sense, they 
both pursue the inquiry for ultimate principles — funda- 
mental being and first causes ; an inquiry which, pushed 
to the utmost, seeks the Being who is alike the First 
Substance and the First Cause. Perhaps, strictly 
speaking, this is the signification in which philosophy 
also should be used. But the attempt to restrict these 
terms to that narrow, and it may be proper sense, would 
be like rowing against wind and tide. Popular usage 
would render its success almost hopeless. The chair 
which Sir William Hamilton filled in the University of 
Edinburgh was entitled, the Chair of Logic and Meta- 
physics, and the learned editors of his works denomi- 
nate his philosophical lectures, Lectures on Metaphysics, 
notwithstanding the fact that they are mainly con- 
cerned about psychology, and only to a small extent 
about ontology. The same nomenclature is well-nigh 
universal in Britain and America. Metaphysics, ac- 
cordingly, must," at least popularly, be conceded a wider 
sweep than ontology. The same is true of philosophy; 
and further, it must be admitted that the usus loquendi 
makes philosophy cover a larger field than metaphysics. 
It would be eccentric to talk of moral metaphysics, while 
it is common to speak of moral philosophy. In like 
manner, it would be inadmissible to say the metaphysics 
of science, although it is usual to employ the terms phil- 



LSTTKODUCTKXN". 13 

osophy of science; not as implying that science is phil- 
osophical, but as designating the effort to account for 
the phenomenal facts of science upon unphenomenal 
and ultimate principles. 

While, then, it may be proper for one to guard him- 
self against the supposition that his ignorance induces 
him to comply with prevailing custom, it would be both 
pedantic and quixotic in him to traverse its current in 
order to secure technical accuracy. None but an over- 
mastering genius, which would compel the homage and 
the obedience of the learned world, could venture to 
make such an attempt. 

2. These discussions proceed upon the ground that 
metaphysical science is progressive. 

The taunt is sometimes heard that the science makes 
no progress. A few considerations will serve to show 
that this charge is unwarranted. 

(1.) For a long time the deductive method too exclu- 
sively prevailed ; but the inductive has come to be very 
generally employed, not as extruding the former, but as 
furnishing the data upon which it competently proceeds. 
This is true even in Germany, where the absolutist phil- 
osophers were accustomed to speak slightingly of con- 
sciousness and the processes of the inductive school. 
The almost universal habit of now interrogating con- 
sciousness by painstaking psychological inquiry, for the 
purpose of ascertaining the facts upon which the con- 
clusions of metaphysics ought to be based, is certainly 
an indication of progress. 

(2.) There has been a decided advance in the enun- 
ciation and development of a priori principles — the 



14 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

fundamental laws of thought and belief in relation to 
the processes of the logical understanding and the noetic 
reason, and of the original laws of morality in relation 
to those of the moral nature, relations indicated, as facts, 
by psychological investigation. 

(3.) For centuries the majority of philosophers 
adopted the hypothesis of representative preception, or 
hypothetical realism. Especially since the rise of the 
Scottish school, the tendency of philosophical thought 
has been marked in the direction of abandoning that 
hypothesis, and of adopting the opposite theory of the 
immediate knowledge of the external world, so far as 
it is related to our faculties. Progress has been made in 
the matters of the duality of consciousness as affirming 
matter and spirit — to use the exquisite language of 
Hamilton — in the synthesis of knowledge and the anti- 
thesis of existence, and as testifying to the certainty of 
objective reality. The thin line of witnesses to "the 
one catholic and perennial philosophy" of common 
sense has swelled into the army of modern thinkers. 

(4.) There has been notable progress in the evolu- 
tion of the doctrine of presentative and representative 
knowledge — of immediate and mediate cognition. 

(5.) There has been, in some degree, progress in fix- 
ing the certainty of principles and doctrines, arising 
from the conflict of opinions, analogous to that which 
in theology has resulted from controversies in the 
church. The scepticism of Hume, for example, stimu- 
lated profound investigations which have gone far to 
settle the all-important question of the certitude of 
human knowledge. The sensationalism of Condillac 



LsTTEODUCTION. 15 

and the French encyclopedists, and the associational- 
ism of the Mills and others, have contributed to define 
the difference between the knowledge derived from 
sense-perception and that originating in certain funda- 
mental laws of our mental constitution. The absolutist 
controversy has tended to fix the limitations of the 
mental powers, particularly the boundaries of the think- 
ing faculty, and at the same time it has enhanced con- 
fidence in the existence of native principles in the mind 
which, while they ground the possibility of experience, 
depend upon it in turn for their development. It has 
made more distinct the divisions between the domains 
of conception and faith, and so has clarified the obscure 
inquiries of ontology by assigning the restrictions under 
which thought proceeds, and by determining the proper 
office of faith, and the sweep of the peculiar judgments 
which it necessitates, in contradistinction to those which 
are the appropriate results of the comparative faculty. 
3. It is not uncommon to hear it asserted, that the 
conclusions of physical science are more trustworthy 
than those of mental. But it must be remembered that, 
in the last resort, the physical investigator employs the 
same organ as the psychological. The former depends 
on the trustworthiness of consciousness as well as the 
latter. It is true that the observer of external phe- 
nomena employs the senses. But the senses are instru- 
ments through which consciousness operates. The real 
observer is consciousness. That this is the fact is proved 
by the consideration that immediately after death the 
sense-organs may be as perfect as they were before. 
How can we account for their inoperativeness, except 



16 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

upon the ground that consciousness has ceased to act 
through them ? If this be so, the ultimate trustworthi- 
ness of observations made by means of the senses is 
based upon the veracity of consciousness. Is it not ob- 
vious, then, that however different may be their methods, 
the physical inquirer and the psychologist alike assume 
the necessity of relying upon the deliverances of con- 
sciousness ? The ground of certainty to both is pre- 
cisely the same. 

It is, moreover, pertinent to suggest that in the case 
of the physical investigator the senses intervene between 
consciousness and the external facts — the relation be- 
tween them is not immediate 1 , while in that of the 
psychologist nothing comes between consciousness and 
the internal phenomena — the relation is direct. In 
view of this fact it is hardly legitimate for the physical 
observer to say, that his reports of phenomena are more 
certain than those of the psychologist. 

It must be added that in relation to conclusions de- 
rived from phenomenal facts with regard to things 
which are themselves not phenomenal, the physical in- 
vestigator and the psychologist stand upon the same 
foot, so far as trustworthiness is concerned. They both 
resort to inference. Their method is the same. It will 
not be denied that inference is a mental act. They both, 
therefore, employ the metaphysical method. Both are 
liable to the mistakes resulting from wrong inferences, 
and the trustworthiness of their inferences believed to 
be right rests exactly upon the same grounds. That the 

1 Of course, there is no reference here to an intervening mental 
modification. 



Intkoductiois". 17 

physical observer should indict the psychologist because 
of the untrustworthiness of his metaphysical inferences 
would be, for the same reason, to indict himself. How, 
for example, does the physical man know the existence 
of his ultimate atoms ? He has never observed them. 
It is clear that he infers them. How does the metaphysi- 
cal man know his First Cause of all things? He has 
never preceived it. It is equally clear that he infers it. 
The respective inferences depend upon the same funda- 
mental laws of our intellectual constitution. If false in 
their application in the one case, they are false in the 
other ; if true in the one case, they are true in the other. 
The charge of uncertainty and untrustworthiness as to 
ontological results, if preferred by physical science 
against metaphysics, recoils, as to those results, upon 
itself. Either, then, physical science should refrain 
from the allegation, or confine itself to the simple obser- 
vation, registry and classification of phenomenal facts. 
But should the latter alternative be adopted, what would 
become of Mr. Herbert Spencer and his objections to 
positivism ? 

4. It is one purpose of these discussions to oppose the 
following philosophical schemes: Idealism in all its 
forms, pantheism, materialism, and agnosticism. As 
to physiological psychology, it is admitted that there 
may legitimately be attempted a science concerned about 
the relations between the mind and the nervous organ- 
ism, and consequently between psychology and physi- 
ology. But the crypto-materialism which is in a greater 
or less degree insinuated by some of the writers on this 
subject, and the undisguised materialism of others, is 



18 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

resisted. Sensationalism or pure empiricism on the 
one hand, and, on the other, pure subjectivism as de- 
veloped in transcendental absolutism, are to a greater 
or less extent criticised. Herbert Spencer's theory in 
regard to the relativity of knowledge is antagonized. 
Argument is presented to show that space and duration 
are neither relations, nor conditions either of existence 
or of thought, nor substances, but are perfections of the 
Infinite Spirit. 

5. It is necessary to say something definitely in an- 
swer to the question, What school of philosophy do these 
discussions represent? The answer is, The Scottish 
school — mainly. It may briefly bo indicated in what 
respects they agree with the doctrines of that school, 
and in what they differ from them. 

(1.) They concur with it in maintaining the great 
a priori laws and principles contended for by the phil- 
osophy of common sense; the doctrine of natural real- 
ism or absolute dualism, which affirms the substantive 
difference between matter and spirit "contrasted in the 
antithesis of existence," but "related in the synthesis of 
knowledge" ; the immediate knowledge of the external 
world, and — with. Hamilton — the consciousness of the 
external world, so far as it is related to our faculty of 
preception; the position that the fundamental laws of 
thought and belief, as Stewart terms them, need to be 
elicited from latency, and actually developed into formal 
expression, by the conditions of conscious experience; 
the principle of the conditioned, as stated by Hamilton, 
so far as it holds that the sphere of positive thought is 
bounded on all sides by the sphere of the Inconceivable ; 



ItfTKODUCTIOlT. 19 

the limitation of consciousness to phenomena, internal 
and external; the distinction between presentative and 
representative knowledge; the broader distinction be- 
tween immediate and mediate knowledge; and the sig- 
nificance and validity of mediate knowledge. In regard 
to some of these points Hamilton's utterances are some- 
times difficult to be reconciled with each other, and 
sometimes incapable of being brought into harmony; 
but the statements made above are believed to exhibit 
his real, catholic doctrine. 

(2.) They differ from doctrines held by members of 
the Scottish school in these particular respects : from 
the doctrine of Reid, that we are conscious of the act 
by which we perceive an external object, but not of the 
object itself; from the view of Hamilton, that we are 
conscious of the act of perceiving the external object, 
it being here maintained that the act of perceiving the 
external object and the consciousness of that object are 
one and the same; from Hamilton's theory, that con- 
sciousness is a generic, and not a special faculty, it be- 
ing here, on the contrary, held that it is a special faculty, 
with a catholic relation to the operations of all the other 
faculties ; from Hamilton's inconsistent hypothesis, that, 
in being conscious of the operation of any faculty, we 
are at the same time conscious of the object about which 
that operation is concerned; from Hamilton's position 
that every effect is made up of its causes as its constitu- 
ents; from his doctrine in regard to the genesis of the 
causal judgment, he referring it to a mental impotence, 
and it being here contended that it is the affirmation of 
a positive power ; and from his advocacy of the possibil- 



20 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ity of an absolute commencement, as illustrated in every 
free act of the will. 

6. Should the question be asked, What ends are 
sought to be accomplished by these discussions ? the an- 
swer is, in the general, that the writer desired clearly 
to explicate and enounce the views derived from his own 
reflections, and that this desire was enhanced by the 
duty, bound upon him professionally, to deliver a brief 
course of philosophical lectures, during each session, in 
the institution to which he is attached. More particu- 
larly — and the answer is given in all modesty — the end 
contemplated by the writer has been to contribute some- 
thing, so far as his abilities would allow, towards a fuller 
development of the distinctive principles of the Scottish 
philosophy. 

Those principles constrained his adherence by their 
agreement, in his judgment, with the data of conscious- 
ness and their necessary consequences, with the common 
convictions of mankind, and with the doctrines of divine 
revelation. But although considered to be for the most 
part sound and superior to any other system, the Scot- 
tish philosophy did not appear to be free from certain 
grave defects, or to have reached the point of a consum- 
mate development. This seemed to be true, notwith- 
standing the fact that the extraordinary learning and 
acumen of Sir William Hamilton were employed in the 
effort to bring it to maturity. Indeed, it must be con- 
fessed that the attempt of the great philosopher to ex- 
pand, systematize and perfect it was attended with cer- 
tain inconsistencies of statement and questionable doc- 
trinal utterances, together with some ambiguity in his 



Inteoduction. 21 

positions, which resulted unhappily. They exposed him 
to the unfriendly criticism of his associationalist op- 
ponent, John Stuart Mill, gave some plausibility to the 
claim of Herbert Spencer that his agnosticism is justi- 
fied by Hamilton's doctrine touching the knowledge of 
the Infinite, and — "most unkindest cut of all" ! — in- 
duced some of the supporters of the Scottish philosophy 
to impute to him the maintenance of the utter incognos- 
cibility of God, and the atheistic tendencies of that view ! 

The opportunity is thus offered to friends of the 
Scottish philosophy, as having received its fullest ex- 
pansion at the hands of Hamilton, of endeavoring to 
clear up ambiguities in the form in which he left it, to 
reconcile incongruities where that is possible, where that 
is impracticable to correct the wrong or imperfect state- 
ments by those which are most clearly established, and 
even to disprove untenable positions and substitute in 
their room those which are tenable ; and in this way to 
bring the system into harmony with itself. Some little 
has been essayed along these lines in these discussions. 

This, however, is not all. The effort is also made to 
bring out into explicit and formal enouncement princi- 
ples which, though implicitly contained in the system, 
depend rather upon scattered intimations than upon 
formulated statements, and thus, in some degree, to as- 
sist in advancing the Scottish philosophy towards a 
completer and more definite development. Some of the 
points will be briefly noticed at which the attainment 
of this result is sought. 

(1.) The doctrine in relation to consciousness. 

The Scottish philosophers, especially Hamilton, treat 



22 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

consciousness and perception as different powers. In 
Hamilton's case, the reason is plain. He regarded con- 
sciousness as a generic faculty of cognition containing 
under it all the subordinate cognitive faculties as species. 
Considering perception as one of these specific powers, 
he was of course led to affirm a difference between con- 
sciousness and perception. In these discussions argu- 
ment is submitted to show that this is an illegitimate re- 
duction, according to Hamilton's own principles. The 
argument proceeds on the nature of these powers. 

In connection with this, Hamilton's canon that con- 
sciousness is to the philosopher what the Bible is to the 
theologian — that is, that it is possessed of supreme au- 
thoritativeness, needs to be suplemented by the addition 
to mere consciousness of logical, necessary inferences 
from its data. 

(2.) The doctrine as to the generic source of know- 
ledge. 

Instead of consciousness as the generic source of 
knowledge, the reason or intelligence is here represented 
as that generic source. Under this undisputed genus 
comes the species — immediate and mediate knowledge. 
Consciousness being immediate knowledge, nothing 
more and nothing less, is the sole occupant of that cate- 
gory. The faculty of mediate knowledge includes under 
it specific faculties of that kind of knowledge — namely, 
the representative, the thinking, and the believing. At 
the root of all these faculties lie their appropriate laws : 
at the root of consciousness the laws of immediate know- 
ledge ; at the root of the representative faculty the laws 
of representation; at that of the thinking faculty the 



Inteoductiok. 23 

laws of thought ; and at that of the believing faculty the 
laws of belief. Each one of these faculties, operating in 
obedience to its own laws, furnishes a specific kind of 
knowledge peculiar to it; and all these specific know- 
ledges are gathered up into a generic result — knowledge. 
This reduction gets quit of the vexed question touching 
a generic difference between reason and faith on the one 
hand, and faith and knowledge on the other. There is 
no generic difference between them. To this the Scottish 
philosophy logically tends. 

(3.) The doctrine as to a believing faculty. 

Careful argument is here presented to prove the ex- 
istence in our cognitive nature of a faculty of belief or 
faith. Without such a faculty the Scottish philosophy 
is restricted to the merely phenomenal, indeed, is rent 
by self-contradictions. One of its canons is that thought 
cannot transcend consciousness. A faculty ? therefore, 
is postulated which can transcend the materials fur- 
nished by consciousness. That faculty is faith. It is a 
faculty of knowledge. 

(4.) The doctrine as to the distinct provinces of 
thought and faith. 

It is admitted here that Hamilton is right in affirming 
that thought cannot give substance, immortality and 
God. They are not thought-judgments. To what power 
then are these transcendental apprehensions to be as- 
signed ? He answers, To belief. We believe in the sub- 
stance of matter, in the substance of the soul, in immor- 
tality, in God. Now the question is whether these faith- 
judgments are knowledge. Do we, for instance, know 
God \ His utterances upon this vital question are am- 



24 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

biguous. At times he intimates that we mediately know 
him; at other times, even under challenge, he hesitates 
to call our belief in God knowledge. But there ought 
upon this subject to be no hesitation, no uncertain sound. 
In these discussions it is contended that our faith in 
God is a real knowledge, as valid as immediate know- 
ledge and infinitely more valuable — that our faith- judg- 
ments constitute the most significant knowledge that we 
possess. It is mediate knowledge, but it is vastly more 
precious than immediate. 

(5.) The question, How does thought deal with mat- 
ter that transcends its scope ? 

The difficulty is common to philosophy and theology, 
how a science can be constructed which involves an infi- 
nite element. The thinking faculty is the organ of 
science. But it cannot know the infinite. How, then, 
can it embrace the infinite in its syllogistic reasoning? 
If faith which does apprehend the infinite could reason 
in regard to it, the difficulty would be met. But faith 
does not deal with logic. The difficulty, therefore, re- 
turns. The answer here given is that faith and thought 
are attributes of the same man. It is he who believes 
and he who thinks. His faith communicates the know- 
ledge of the infinite to his thinking faculty, and the lat- 
ter, receiving the information, uses it symbolically in its 
logical processes, somewhat as a child learning algebra 
expresses an unknown quantity by x, and reasons from 
it and about it as if he comprehended it. The matter is 
given by faith, and the form by thought. Take this 
syllogism: Only an infinite being had power to create 
the universe ; God is an infinite being, therefore he had 



Introduction. 25 

power, etc. The terms in both premises express un- 
thinkable realities. Nevertheless the syllogism is valid. 
The wonderful synergism of the believing and the think- 
ing faculties solves the problem. Had Hamilton evolved 
his principles as he might have done, and as he ought 
to have done, he would not now, when he is sleeping in 
his grave, be unjustly claimed as the logical parent of 
agnosticism. 

The Scottish philosopher was, to some extent, con- 
fessedly influenced by the views of the profound Ger- 
man philosopher, Jacobi, and it is a pity that he had not, 
with his masterly powers, reduced them disencumbered 
of certain blemishes to a more systematic form. For a 
time the sound principles of Jacobi were overborne by 
the brilliant but fallacious speculations of the absolutist 
school, and may now, in measure, be lost sight of while 
the pendulum of thought vibrates to the opposite ex- 
treme of materialism ; but, with the exception of the de- 
fects implicated in them, they will, in the destined tri- 
umph of truth in a golden age, be brought to the front 
and win a wider and happier recognition — "a consum- 
mation devoutly to be wished." 

Should he, who is the Creator of our minds and the 
"Enlightener of their darkness," vouchsafe to use these 
discussions in stimulating some able thinker to advance 
the development of the common sense philosophy, and 
the Scottish which is its chief exponent, they will not 
have been written for naught. 



DISCUSSIONS 



OF 



Philosophical Questions 



THE END OF PHILOSOPHY. 

PKOCEEDHSTG upon the assumption that the 
method of philosophy is that of analysis and 
synthesis, we go on to inquire, What is its end f In the 
general, the answer is, An ultimate principle of unity, 
a principle, that is, upon which the diversified and in- 
numerable elements of the soul, the external world in im- 
mediate contact with us, and the universe at large, may 
be collected into unity. Hamilton says that the end 
sought by philosophy is a First Cause in the sense of a 
First, Efficient Cause. Agreeing with him as far as he 
goes, I am constrained to broaden his statement so as 
explicitly to include in the end of philosophy a First 
Substance. The end which it seeks may then be con- 
sidered as an ultimate, fundamental Being, who is 
alike First Cause and First Substance. The process by 
which we are led from effect to cause is not more im- 
perative than that by which we are conducted from at- 
tribute to substance. Given cause, we necessarily infer 
a power which causes, and with equal necessity refer 

27 



28 Discussion's of Philosophical Questions. 

power as an attribute to a substance in which it inheres. 
This Hamilton would of course have admitted, but it 
would seem best to give both elements of the process ex- 
press and formal enouncement. We shall see, it is 
hoped, as the analysis advances, that this ultimate 
Being — this Principium Essendi, who is both First 
Cause and First Substance, cannot be either the blind 
force of the agnostic, nor the unconscious ground of 
existence of the pantheist; that while as Infinite, he 
transcends all finite analogy, he is characterized by at- 
tributes which are dimly but really shadowed forth by 
those of finite spirits. 

In the attempt to indicate the process by which we 
seek an ultimate principle of unity, let us notice the 
mode in which that process operates in the spheres re- 
spectively of the spiritual and material systems. 

I. Let us endeavor to observe its operation in the 
spiritual system. 

1. It is proper to begin with the individual soul, and 
show, if we can, how through our various phenomenal 
states and acts we are irresistibly conducted to its unity. 
Our cognitive operations are diversified. We perceive, 
imagine, remember, conceive, judge, reason, believe. 
But different as these operations are from each other, 
we are compelled to observe a feature which is common 
to them all. They are all cognitive. We are obliged 
to refer them to one cause of which they are effects. 
That cause is a power of cognition. We cannot by any 
effort assign each of these cognitive functions to a sepa- 
rate and independent cognitive power. They have one 
and the same cause. But power is an attribute, and we 



The End of Philosophy. 29 

are impelled by a native conviction, call it a funda- 
mental law of belief or by some other name, to refer an 
attribute to a substance. Hence we assign this cogni- 
tive power to a cognitive substance. That substance is 
what we denominate the soul. We affirm a cognitive 
essence to which the power of cognition belongs, a power 
which causes those phenomenal effects that fall under 
the designation of cognitions. Along this special line, 
therefore, we are led to a principle of relative unity in 
one intelligent soul. It cannot be one soul that per- 
ceives, another that thinks, and another that believes, 
etc. The supposition cannot for a moment be endured. 
It is one and the same soul which energizes in these 
diverse ways. 

A similar process of analysis will hold good in regard 
to the feelings. The phenomenal manifestations of 
feeling are various. These we ascribe to a common 
power of feeling as their cause, and again attach this 
power as an attribute to an emotional substance. That 
substance is the soul, which abides one and the same 
while manifesting itself in these different modes. Along 
this line also we are conducted to relative unity in one 
emotional essence, It is not one soul which feels hate, 
another which feels love, etc. It is the same soul which 
expresses itself in these differing feelings. 

The same is true of our voluntary states and acts. 
They are many, but we are constrained to collect them 
into unity upon a voluntary power, which by an 
equal necessity we refer to a single voluntary substance. 
It would be absurd to speak of several wills, as ex- 
pressed by different inclinations, conations and voli- 



30 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tions. It is one and the same will which energizes in 
these various forms. And it is pertinent to remark that 
it is in this way that the native conviction of person- 
ality and of our personal identity is mainly elicited 
into formal expression. The seat of personality is in 
the will. A being might be conceived to possess intelli- 
gence and feelings without a will, but he could not be 
a person. Thus, in still another method analysis con- 
ducts us to relative unity. 

The same process obtains in the sphere of conscience. 
We postulate unity for our moral powers in the soul as 
moral. Conscious of the laws of rectitude at the root 
of the conscience, we demand a common seat for them 
all. It cannot be one soul which delivers the law of 
truth, another which enforces the law of justice, and 
still another which gives the law of benevolence. It may 
not be possible to reduce these laws, intrinsically, to 
the same category, but we necessarily infer that they ex- 
press one and the same moral essence. We are also con- 
scious of moral perceptions, of moral sentiments, of 
moral judgments, of moral emotions which are the 
sanctions of those judgments, but we cannot believe that 
they represent different moral substances ; we are com- 
pelled to collect them into unity upon the power which 
we denominate conscience, and which we necessarily 
attribute to one and the same soul, developing its moral 
energies in these different modes of manifestation. The 
same soul which possesses moral laws, perceptions and 
sentiments, and in accordance with them issues its cate- 
gorical and penal imperatives, is that which passes judg- 
ment upon itself in the shape of approval or condemna- 



The End of Philosophy. 31 

tion, reward or punishment, and experiences the satis- 
faction of its own favor or the sting of its own remorse. 
We are thus led to predicate unity of our moral phe- 
nomena, and of the power which they manifest, in con- 
sequence of a common relation to a single moral essence. 

So far, in pursuing our analysis, we have been con- 
ducted to points of unity, upon which are collected dis- 
tinctive phenomena and powers — points of unity re- 
lated to these phenomena and powers, and determined 
by their peculiar characteristics. Shall we rest here? 
Is there no higher unity upon which these relative 
units may be collected ? Are there several souls mani- 
fested by these various operations ? a cognitive soul, an 
sesthetical, a voluntary, and a moral ? With such a re- 
duction we cannot be satisfied. We are constrained to 
go on in our analysis until we reach one soul which, as 
a unit, collects upon its single essence all these dis- 
tinctive powers, and to which they are referred as at- 
tributes — a soul Which is alike intelligent, emotional, 
voluntary and moral. 

(1.) We necessarily believe in the common relation 
of the different mental powers to one personal self. 
Each individual human being is conscious of referring 
intellectual acts, feelings, volitions, and moral judg- 
ments to himself as one. 

(2.) Every individual believes in the relation of each 
mental power to every other mental power as belonging 
to one and the same personal essence. It is his mental 
perceptions which affect his feelings, his perceptions 
and feelings which influence his will, his will through 
which he reflectively determines the current or the direc- 



32 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tion of his intellectual acts and his feelings. They are 
all his as one and the same self. 

First, this is proved by one's sense of responsibility 
for this reciprocal influence of the mental powers. 

Secondly, one has no such sense of responsibility for 
another man's states or acts unless he influenced them. 
He is not responsible for another's states of mind or 
feeling which induced a criminal act. The reason is 
plain. His soul is different from every other man's soul, 
but is one and the same soul which expresses itself 
through his different mental powers. 

Thirdly, at fifty years of age one has a sense of re- 
sponsibility for the influence of his perceptions, imagi- 
nations and feelings in producing a bad volition, or a 
criminal act at twenty. 

(3.) If certain bodily powers, different from one an- 
other, are consciously one's own — are unified upon one's 
personal self; certain mental powers, different from 
each other, are also consciously one's own — are reduced 
to unity upon himself as one indivisible essence. 

(4.) The processes of law, human and divine, prove 
the unity of the soul; that is, the fact that each indi- 
vidual man has only one soul. To plead that an intel- 
lectual soul, and a feeling soul, and a moral soul, con- 
demned the criminal act of a voluntary soul would not 
avail to save a man's neck. And the fact that no such 
plea is ever presented by the ingenuity of man is suffi- 
cient to show that it would not be regarded as rational. 
Only an insane man could use it. The inference is clear. 
All the mental powers belong to one and the same soul. 

But it may be urged that the quest for unity is not 



The End of Philosophy. 33 

yet ended ; that even though it be admitted that all the 
various mental powers may be collected upon one soul, 
that soul may not be simple, but compound. Against 
this supposition but two arguments will be used. 

(1.) The conviction of the race is that the soul is an 
essence, simple and indivisible. This is proof enough 
by itself. What all men believe must be true, or human 
nature is radically deceptive. 

(2.) The argument of Bishop Butler is submitted: 
"Since consciousness is a single and indivisible power, 
it should seem that the subject in which it resides must 
be so too. For were the motion of any particle of mat- 
ter absolutely one and indivisible, so as that it would 
imply a contradiction to suppose part of this motion to 
exist, and part not to exist, i. e., part of this matter to 
move, and part to be at rest; then its power of motion 
would be indivisible; and so also would the subject in 
which the power inheres, namely, the particle of mat- 
ter: for if this could be divided into two, one part might 
be moved and the other at rest, which is contrary to the 
supposition. In like manner it has been argued, and, 
for anything appearing to the contrary, justly, that 
since the perception or consciousness, which we have of 
our own existence, is indivisible, so as that it is a contra- 
diction to suppose one part of it should be here and the 
other there; the perecptive power, or the power of con- 
sciousness, is indivisible too : and consequently the sub- 
ject in which it resides ; i. e., the conscious Being." 

It has thus far been shown that in contemplating the 
diversified phenomena of consciousness we are impelled 
to refer them to appropriate causes; that these causes 



34 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

infer several powers, and that these powers as attributes 
are collected into unity upon the essence of an individual 
soul. 

But every soul is different from every other soul, and 
as there are multitudes of souls, the question arises, Can 
they be reduced to unity upon one ultimate cause ? That 
they can will first he shown by some general considera- 
tions, and then by separate proofs derived from the ra- 
tional, the moral, and the religious nature of man. 

(1.) Every soul is finite. The consciousness of each 
proves that fact to itself. Should any exceptional 
thinker assert the contrary, it can easily be evinced by 
challenging him to solve some inexplicable problem — 
and there are many such — or to visit the moon, the near- 
est heavenly body, and give an account of it from obser- 
vation. It were folly to deny the finiteness of every 
human spirit. 

Now each was either spontaneously produced, or im- 
mediately created, or evolved by descent. Spontaneous 
production, as implying an absolute commencement, is 
contradictory and absurd; and the hypothesis is now 
very generally abandoned. Immediate creation would 
give unity to all finite spirits upon the causal production 
of one Creator. It would be absurd to suppose as many 
creators as there are finite spirits, for to create one 
spirit implies infinite power, and there cannot be as 
many infinite powers as there are created spirits. If 
immediate creation be denied and evolution affirmed, 
then every spirit is held to have descended from one 
original source (by whatever name designated), and 
subordinate unity is conceded. 



The End of Philosophy. 35 

The dilemma then occurs: That original existence 
was either spontaneously generated or immediately 
created. Spontaneous generation must be rejected, im- 
mediate creation allowed ; and we are conducted to ulti- 
mate unity upon a First Cause. Cause infers power, 
and the ultimate unit must be a First Substance possess- 
ing infinite power. 

Again: The plurality of spirits proves the finiteness 
of each. For, if not finite, they are infinite. But there 
cannot be more than one Infinite. If two, they would 
limit and condition one another, which is contrary to the 
supposition of infinity. All spirits, being finite, must 
have had a beginning. Either, then, they were sponta- 
neously produced, or evolved, or immediately created. 
They were not spontaneously produced; but if either 
evolved or immediately created, they infer one, ulti- 
mate, Infinite Being. Final unity is reached. 

(2.) The essential likeness between all human souls 
infers one origin. Either all had the same cause, or 
each had a separate cause. If the latter, there would be 
as many causes as souls. But it is absurd to suppose a 
multitude of causes, or even two causes, acting sepa- 
rately, to produce results essentially the same. Was 
there a convention of causes which issued in a common 
agreement to produce exactly similar effects ? And 
could a convention of causes which, on the supposition, 
were finite have determined to do what only an infinite 
cause could accomplish? If the former — that all had 
the same cause, we arrive at unity in the First Cause. 

More particularly : 

(1.) Consider the soul as intelligent. 



36 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

First, it has a fundamental belief in unity. This 
cannot meet ultimate satisfaction in relative unities. 
For they require, in accordance with its demand, to bo 
reduced as many to one. The regression of the intelli- 
gence, in obedience to this fundamental law, is neces- 
sarily to absolute unity, and that can only be found in an 
absolute and infinite Being. 

Secondly, the soul has a fundamental belief in space, 
and, as is well-night universally admitted, in space as 
infinite. ~Row either space is merely a subjective belief 
or an objective reality. If the former, the subjective 
belief is infinite, which is a contradiction, for an infinite 
element cannot be predicated of a finite subject ; and the 
belief itself in infinite space, if it have no objective 
reality, would be a lie. If the latter, as there caunot 
be two infinite realities, independent of each other, space 
must be the mode of an infinite substance — the view- 
less, all-comprehending immensity of an Infinite Spirit. 1 
If, therefore, the belief be not deceptive, the fundamen- 
tal intelligence of the soul points to ultimate unity in an 
ultimate Being. 

Thirdly, the soul has a fundamental belief in cause. 
This, as has been shown by theists and Christian theo- 
logians and conceded by Mr. Herbert Spencer himself, 
when developed upon empirical conditions, inevitably 
leads through the contingent and finite to a necessary 
and infinite Cause. But cause supposes power, and 
power substance; and a necessary and infinite Being is 
confessed as reducing everything to ultimate unity upon 
his causal efficiency. 

1 This view is not singular. It was held by Philo, Derodon and 
Samuel Clarke, and, substantially, by Sir Isaac Newton. 



The End of Philosophy. 37 

Now, as every soul possesses these fundamental be- 
liefs, the intelligence of each, like every strand in a 
spider's web, converges with that of every other to a 
common centre. That centre is the point of absolute 
and ultimate unity; and that unity is found alone in 
God. 

(2.) Contemplate the soul as moral. 

The consciousness of moral obligation — the ineradi- 
cable sense of duty and conviction of responsibility — 
infers a law-giver, ruler and judge by whose will we 
are obliged. Either this law-giver, ruler and judge is 
the soul itself, or one extraneous to the soul. That the 
former supposition cannot be true is conclusively set- 
tled by the desire and the inability of the soul to escape 
from the condemnation and the punishment which it 
would not inflict and yet is compelled to inflict upon 
itself. It is manifestly under the government of an- 
other, who is superior to itself. It cannot be either the 
original source or the enforcer of its own morality. 

But there are as many moral units as there are souls. 
We must seek a higher unity. Of every one of these 
various souls the same things are true as those which 
have been affirmed of a single soul. They are all funda- 
mentally alike as to their moral constitution. This is 
so evident that it need not be sustained by argument. 
Whatever special differences may exist in the applica- 
tion of the laws which lie at the foundation of the moral 
nature, there can be no denial that all men have a moral 
nature and are conscious, to some extent, of moral obli- 
gation. The feeling of duty is a universal characteristic 
of the race. If this be so, what has been said in regard 



38 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

to the individual soul must hold good of every other. 
But if this he admitted, the law-giver, ruler and judge 
of all must he one and the same. It would he infinitely 
contradictory and absurd to suppose as many law- 
givers, rulers and judges as there are moral subjects. 
There has, however, been an ancient hypothesis, de- 
vised by speculation to meet the obvious fact of the co- 
presence of moral good and evil in the world, which 
postulates two original, co-eternal principles or beings, 
the one the author of good, the other of evil. Does such 
an hypothesis possess plausibility enough to arrest our 
search for ultimate unity in the moral sphere ? 

(1.) An eternal being would be an infinite being. 
The two predications cannot be disjoined. To this it 
may be replied that there is no contradiction in suppos- 
ing a thing to be eternal which yet is not infinite. Two 
lines, for example, may run out ad infinitum; that is, 
may be co-eternal. The rejoinder is that, strictly speak- 
ing, no line can be eternal. For a line is a series of 
points. E concessO; each point is finite. If finite, it must 
have had a beginning. For if it had no beginning, it 
would be infinite, which is contrary to the supposition. 
But if it had a beginning, it could not be eternal, since 
the very definition of an eternal thing is that it had no 
beginning, and will have no end. Now, whatever is 
predicable of all the parts of the series is predicable 
of the whole. The series of points, the line, therefore, 
cannot be eternal. If duration be conceived simply as a 
line, it cannot be eternal. Eternal duration infers a 
being who is infinite, and therefore immense. Such a 
being excludes another infinite and consequently im- 



The End of Philosophy. 39 

mense being. For each would limit and condition the 
other, which is contrary to the supposition of infinity 
involving immensity. A finite eternal being is a contra- 
diction in terms ; and two infinite eternal beings would 
be a contradiction in reality. 

Neither can there be an eternal plane. For a plane 
is a congeries of lines, and what is predicable of one line 
is predicable of all. As all had a beginning, so must 
the plane. If it had a beginning, it could not have been 
eternal. 

JSTor, further, can there be an eternal sphere, for a 
sphere is bounded in every direction, consequently in 
the direction of length. What then is true of a line 
must be true of it. It had a beginning ; therefore, can- 
not be eternal. 

But it may be asked, whether a point may not be 
eternal. The answer must be in the negative; for a 
point, strictly speaking, is the opposite of the immense. 
The immense is the immeasurable. If a point could be 
eternal, it would, in one respect, be immeasurable. It 
would in one aspect be immense ; which involves a con- 
tradiction, since the immense and a point are the oppo- 
site of each other — the one being most easily measurable, 
the other immeasurable. A point, therefore, cannot be 
eternal. ~No more can any number of points massed 
into a bulk, a world, a universe. It may be said that the 
schoolmen described the eternal Being as a punctum 
stans. The language is figurative, and cannot be con- 
strued in strictness. But whatever may be thought of 
the propriety or impropriety of the language, it never 
entered into the head of a schoolman that there could 



40 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

be two such points. He meant one infinite Being, ex- 
clusive of the possibility of another. 

(2.) Two infinite beings would be mutually exclu- 
sive: nothing would be the result of the supposition. 
Either there is but one infinite being or no infinite be- 
ing. The supposition of two is a contradiction in terms. 
For the two would necessarily limit each other — that is, 
both would be finite, which is contradictory to the sup- 
position of the infinity of both. 

(3.) A fortiori, two infinite beings, one good, the 
other evil, would be infinitely opposed to each other, 
for one would be infinitely good, the other infinitely 
evil. Good and evil are contrasts, and infinite good and 
infinite evil are infinite contrasts. The contradiction, 
if possible, deepens. The old puzzle is suggested. If 
an irresistible force should encounter an immovable ob- 
stacle, what would be the result? The supposition in- 
volves a contradiction, and is, therefore, impossible. If 
a force is irresistible, it can encounter no immovable ob- 
stacle ; if an obstacle is immovable, it can be encountered 
by no irresistible force. If a force be infinite, there can 
be no infinite force opposed to it. The supposition is 
impossible that an infinite good force could be resisted 
by an infinite" evil force. Consequently, there cannot 
be two ultimate principles, one of good, the other of 
evil. 

(4.) Whatever exists eternally exists by necessity. 
If it be true that a being who necessarily exists is in- 
finite 1 , we would have upon the supposition of two co- 

1 For an elaborate argument upon this point see Howe's Living 
Temple, 



The End of Philosophy. 41 

eternal beings two infinite beings, and that hypothesis 
has already been convicted of absurdity. 

(5.) The doctrine of a duality of ultimate beings 
contravenes the fundamental faith of the human mind 
in an infinite Being. Unless that faith be delusive — 
and if it is, our mental constitution is a source of false- 
hood — there cannot be, for reasons already specified, 
more than* one eternal Being. 

It does not fall within the scope of this discussion to 
show how the co-existence of moral good and evil con- 
sists with the supposition of one infinite, eternal Being. 
It is sufficient to have presented reasons which appear 
insuperable against the old Manicha?an hypothesis of a 
duality of ultimate moral beings. 

To return now to our inductive argument: Every 
soul is conscious of moral obligation, and that fact neces- 
sarily infers a law-giver, ruler and judge. This again 
supposes a Being who is possessed of universal authority, 
universal knowledge and almighty power. More than 
one such being, we have seen, there cannot be ; for uni- 
versal dominion, omniscience and omnipotence are 
characteristics of an infinite Being ; and it is contradic- 
tory to suppose more than one such Being. AYe have 
reached our point of ultimate unity — we have been con- 
ducted to God, the First Moral Cause, the First Moral 
Substance. He who produces moral beings must be a 
Cause possessed of the attribute of morality, and we are 
by our mental constitution impelled to infer a Sub- 
stance to whom that attribute belongs. We arrive at a 
Fundamental Moral Being, and, unable to go further, 
we bow down and adore. 



43 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

(3.) Look at the soul as religious. 

First, man is naturally religious. Of course, the term 
religious is here used in its broadest sense, as designating 
a native element of the human constitution, without 
reference to the rightfulness or wrongfulness of its ex- 
ercise. Man's nature was made to worship, and if 
throttled by speculation will still cry out for gratifica- 
tion in this direction. Rather than not worship, men 
idealize the objects of nature, the persons they love, or 
even their consciously imperfect selves, and sublimate 
them into deities. The feeling of dependence, the dread 
of evil, the craving for protection, and the profound 
aesthetic emotions demand a deity to whom supplication 
can be addressed and homage paid. 

Secondly, even in those nations in which the popular 
mind, following poetic myths, has peopled every wood 
and mountain, every river and sea, with divinities, 
polytheism has never commended itself to the philo- 
sophical intellect. Reflection has always tended to the 
affirmation of one supreme Intelligence. The religious 
thinkers of mankind have sought for unity in the ob- 
ject of worship. 

Thirdly, this postulate of the reflective intellect is 
grounded in the deepest principles of human nature, 
and the necessary progression of the human faculties. 
Tor, in the first place, the fundamental principle of 
causality requires one First Cause as the explanation 
of the world of contingent and finite effects. In the 
second place, the sense of obligation imbedded in our 
moral nature necessarily leads to one supreme Law- 
giver, Governor and Judge. In the third place, it is un- 



The End of Philosophy. 43 

natural to suppose that the will is obliged to act in con- 
formity with many superior wills. One must be ra- 
garded as supreme ; many sovereigns is out of the ques- 
tion. In the fourth place, the heart must of necessity 
love one object supremely; and as the religious nature 
absorbs the perceptions of the true furnished by the un- 
derstanding, the convictions of the right given by the 
conscience, and the affection for the beautiful, the 
lovely, the glorious felt by the heart, and gathers them 
all up into its own sublime unity, it seeks a correspond- 
ing unity in the being whom it loves and adores — a 
unity which collects into itself all that is apprehended 
as true and right, all that is good, beautiful and glori- 
ous, projected to transcendent, to infinite perfection. 
It offers its incense of worship rw dew dpcarofieytaTw. 

What is true of one soul is true of all souls. The 
worship of all supposes in the Being worshipped the 
possession of omniscience and omnipotence. That is, 
he must be infinite, and as there cannot be more than 
one such Being, we are also conducted by this line of 
inquiry to ultimate unity. 

Having attempted to indicate the process by which 
we arrive at an ultimate principle of unity in the 
spiritual system, intellectual, moral and religious, let 
us — 

II. Notice the operation of this process in the mate- 
rial system. 

The method by which, in the spiritual sphere, we 
have been led to the discovery of ultimate unity holds 
as well in the material. External perception acquaints 
us with the phenomena of the world around us. They 



44 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

are innumerable, but many, if not most of them, so far 
forth as this earth is concerned, exist in the form of 
given syntheses, groups of phenomenal properties, and 
these, in accordance with a tendency of our minds, we 
proceed to analyze, and are induced by a fundamental 
law of our constitution to refer to substances of which 
they are manifestations, and which constitute to each 
of these groups respectively a bond of unity. Here we 
reach subordinate unity at the first stage of our in- 
quiries. What is true of each one of these separate col- 
lections of phenomenal qualities holds also of that larger 
collection, that complex totality of phenomena which 
we call the world. It is capable of being resolved into 
its component substances, as by synthesis we group them 
into its grand unity of complexity. And as for each 
one of these constituent substances to which we refer 
phenomenal properties as their point of unity, we de- 
mand a cause, so for the world as a whole. We are not 
satisfied with the conclusion that it is uncaused any 
more than with a similar conclusion in regard to the 
substances which enter into its composition. Shall we 
say that these substances and the world itself which is 
composed' of them are self -generated, are spontaneously 
produced ? It is not necessary to adduce a metaphysi- 
cal proof of the untenableness of this hypothesis, how- 
ever incontrovertible that proof may be; we need not 
appeal to the argument that to make a thing both cause 
and effect at one and the same time involves a contra- 
diction. The experiments of physical science have them- 
selves, as is confessed, settled the question whether there 
is in nature such a thing as an absolute commencement; 



The End of Philosophy. 45 

the hypothesis of "spontaneous generation" has upon 
grounds of observation been frankly relinquished. 

But there are forces of nature which reveal their ex- 
istence by their effects. May not the substances which 
exist be caused by these physical forces ? Or, may not 
the substances and the forces coincide ? !Now were these 
suppositions admissible, and there is no proof that they 
are, we would still be confronted by the inevitable in- 
quiry, What is their cause? The supposition of their 
spontaneous generation would be attended with the same 
difficulty as opposes that of the spontaneous generation 
of material substances, and would be confessed to be 
fatal upon the hypothesis that substances and forces are 
the same. What, then, is their cause? Are there as 
many causes as there are forces ? It is admitted by Mr. 
Herbert Spencer, the philosophical exponent of the ag- 
nostic school, that the diverse forces of nature are spe- 
cial manifestations of one central force, and that this 
central force is infinite and eternal. Mr. Frederic Har- 
rison has found fault with Mr. Spencer for granting the 
existence of but one infinite and eternal force — was it 
because he feared that the admission leaned too much 
towards theism ? But it would be contradictory to sup- 
pose the existence of more than one infinite and eternal 
force. Here, then, we have unity allowed, and not only 
the unity of the multifarious phenomena of this world, 
but the unity of all worlds. For an infinite force must 
be conceded to operate upon the whole universe. I have 
no disposition to controvert Mr. Spencer's position, so 
far as it establishes the unity of the material system. 
It lies in the very direction in which this discussion 



46' Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tends. The considerations already presented in connec- 
tion with the intellectual and moral systems show that 
Mr. Spencer's infinite force is but the power in exercise 
of an Infinite Spirit, the intelligent, moral, personal 
First Cause and First Substance, from whom the uni- 
verse is not necessarily evolved, but by whom it was 
freely produced. 

Apart, however, from this important concession of 
the great agnostic, the question arises, Why, in the re- 
gression of inquiry, we are not conducted to more than 
one ultimate principle as accounting for the material 
system ? Why one only ? 

1. The constitution of the human mind determines it 
towards unity. This is a fundamental law. Unity is an 
ultimate category. The mind cannot be satisfied until 
unity is reached. 

2. Each separate line of investigation conducts to 
unity ; why not all combined ? The presumption is a 
powerful one in favor of an ultimate principle which ac- 
counts for all existence. Self-consciousness leads us 
through the diverse phenomena, mental and moral, of 
the soul to the unity of the soul itself. If external con- 
sciousness reveals many souls, a kindred process con- 
ducts to a supreme Spirit as the one cause of them all, 
a supreme Law-giver, Ruler and Judge, to whom all are 
alike accountable. So with the diversified phenomena 
of matter: one world, one Cause. And as there are 
many worlds, analogy of procedure produces the con- 
viction of one Cause for these many worlds. This pre- 
sumption is enhanced by the evidence, first, that one law 
of attraction seems to prevail in all and binds them into 



The End of Philosophy. 47 

a harmonious whole; secondly, that the materials com- 
posing them, so far as known, by the spectroscope, for 
example, are alike. One plan infers one planning mind. 

3. The argument is resistless, founded upon the uni- 
versally admitted axiom : What is predicable of all the 
parts is predicable of the whole. All matter is finite. 
For if some be finite — and that is demonstrated by ex- 
perience — no matter can be infinite. Otherwise we 
would have infinite matter plus finite, which would be 
a contradiction. We are obliged, therefore, to postu- 
late a cause outside of the finite series to account for its 
beginning. If there were many causes, they would be 
finite; for they would limit and condition each other, 
and consequently could not be infinite. Each of these 
would be an effect, and must have had a cause for its 
beginning. We strike the path of an infinite regression 
of causes and effects ; which is absurd. The same axiom 
would hold in regard to such a series ; all the parts are 
finite, therefore the whole is finite. We must get a 
cause outside of these causes which is not itself finite. 
Such a cause must be infinite. But more than one in- 
finite cause would imply a contradiction, since recipro- 
cal limitation would be the result. We reach, therefore, 
one Infinite Cause. Now, cause necessarily supposes 
power ; a cause without energy, potential or active, 
would be a contradiction. But power is an attribute. 
Infinite power infers an infinite Being of whom it is an 
attribute. We reach One Ultimate Principle — prin- 
cipium essendi — the Eirst Cause and the First Sub- 
stance. 

4. The fundamental law of belief in the infinite 



48 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

necessitates belief in one Ultimate, Infinite Being. 
Kant has denied that the existence of a concept is a 
guarantee of the objective reality of the thing con- 
ceived. Very true ; but the existence of a fundamental 
law of belief is in a different category. It must guar- 
antee real existence, else our nature is fundamentally 
false. In this respect I must subscribe to such illus- 
trious thinkers as Anselm, Descartes, Leibnitz and 
Cousin. True, the fundamental law of belief needs to 
be elicited from latency and developed into formal ex- 
pression by the conditions of experience, but when those 
conditions obtain, it necessarily utters itself in the posi- 
tive affirmation of a First Cause, who is the First Sub- 
stance. The name of God is inscribed with his own 
finger upon the foundation stones of the human consti- 
tution, and the light of experience reveals it. Every 
power of the soul, from its deepest recesses, cries out for 
God, and cannot be appeased until it finds him; and 
finding him, the soul grasps the principle of ultimate 
unity. Philosophy has touched her coveted goal; her 
aspirations are satisfied, and speculation is transmuted 
into praise. 



CONSCIOUSNESS: 

WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO SIR WILLIAM 
HAMILTON'S VIEWS. 



THE design of these remarks is to maintain the po- 
sition, that consciousness is the faculty or power 
of immediate knowledge; or, in other words, that it is 
the complement of internal and external perception — 
the presentative faculty. 

I. There is no dispute worth speaking of in regard 
to the question whether consciousness is the immediate 
knowledge of the internal, subjective phenomena of our 
own souls. By immediate knowledge is meant the know- 
ledge of that which is now and here present to us. Of 
the phenomenal activities — the facts now and here 
present — of our inward being as contrasted with the ex- 
ternal world of phenomena, it is, on all sides, admitted 
that we are conscious. We immediately know them. 
But what is denominated internal perception is exactly 
the same thing. Perception gives us the knowledge of 
what is now and here present to us ; internal perception, 
of the phenomenal facts of our subjective being which 
are now and here present to us. We are conscious of 
them, we perceive them, we immediately know them, — 
these affirmations are one and the same. The language 
is different, the thing asserted is identical. 

49 



50 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

II. The second question is, Have we by consciousness 
an immediate knowledge of the external world ? If we 
have, consciousness, immediate knowledge, and percep- 
tion, in relation to the external world, are proved to be 
one and the same. If we have not, consciousness and 
external perception are proved to be different. 

There are two theories which are here encountered — 
that of representative perception, and that of Reid, which 
makes a distinction between the act by which we per- 
ceive the external world and the consciousness of that 
act. Of each in the order in which they have been 
stated. 

The theory of representative perception has been va- 
riously termed hypothetical realism, hypothetical dual- 
ism and cosmothetic idealism. It is denominated rep- 
resentative perceptionism because it holds that the per- 
ception of the external world is mediated through a 
mental image which represents it; hypothetical realism 
or hypothetical dualism, because it hypothecates the real 
existence of an external world different from the know- 
ing subject upon a vicarious image in the mind; cos- 
mothetic idealism, because it posits the external world, 
the cosmos, by means of an ideal representation. 

The masterly argument of Sir William Hamilton in 
opposition to this theory appears to me to be irrefrag- 
able, so far as it goes, with the exceptions that, incon- 
sistently with his own principles, he concedes the con- 
sciousness of the act by which we perceive the external 
world, and that he represents the external object of 
visual perception to be modified by the mind, and to be 
in contact with the bodily organism. If his view be cor- 



The Nature of Consciousness. 51 

rect that in perceiving the external world we are con- 
scious of it, the concession excepted to, would involve the 
position that we are conscious of an act of conscious- 
ness. But of that more anon. The other exception it is 
not material to this discussion to signalize. Holding 
that, with these exceptions, the argument is convincing, 
I take leave to refer to it, and at the same time venture 
to add some considerations which tend in the same direc- 
tion. 

1. One great difficulty urged by the representative 
perceptionist against natural realism is, that it is im- 
possible that spirit can be brought into such a relation 
to matter as to suppose the immediate cognition of the 
latter. To this it may be replied, that the argument 
proves too much ; since it involves the denial of the in- 
tuition of matter by the divine Spirit. On the suppo- 
sition that the substance of matter is not identical with 
the substance of God, the question must arise in regard 
to God's knowledge of matter as different from himself. 
As it is well-nigh universally admitted that his know- 
ledge is intuitive, and not mediate, whatever inability 
there may be on our part to comprehend the relation 
between him and matter, we must admit his immediate 
knowledge of it. The argument therefore proves too 
much, and is, consequently, invalid. But if we concede 
the possibility of the immediate knowledge of matter 
by him who is a pure Spirit, what difficulty is there in 
allowing an immediate knowledge of it by the human 
spirit ? 

2. It is assumed, that as cognition is an immanent, and 
not a transitive act of the mind, to suppose the mind to 



52 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

act immediately upon matter is to suppose it to act out 
of itself ; and that would be contradictory to the nature 
of knowledge and absurd. But why, it may be an- 
swered, should not the mind act where itself is not? 
Is it less active than matter is deemed to be ? One body 
influences another body by the attraction of gravitation, 
although the two are not in contact, but may be at a 
great distance apart. Now, either the force of gravity 
is a property of matter or of spirit. If the former, the 
denial to spirit of the power to act upon what is not part 
of itself, reduces it in the scale of being to a place in- 
ferior to that of matter, which is absurd. If the latter, 
it is granted that spirit can act upon matter, and act 
upon it immediately. If so, the ground of the difficulty 
is removed. 

3. It is contended that in order to the immediate 
cognizance of matter by mind the two should be analo- 
gous substances. 

(1.) The argument used above, derived from God's 
knowledge of material things, also applies here. Is 
there an analogy between the infinite Spirit and matter ? 

(2.) The position necessarily leads to monism. God 
cannot act upon matter if it be different from himself 
as a Spirit. He and the universe are one substance. 
Pure idealism or pure materialism is the inevitable re- 
sult. Upon this principle the hypothesis of representa- 
tive perception is utterly illogical. Matter could no 
more act upon spirit than spirit can be cognizant of 
matter. There is no inter-action possible. Whence 
then the representative image ? If it be a mental modi- 
fication, how does it bring the mind into a near relation 



The Nature of Consciousness. 53 

to matter ? It is mind still, and the gulf is not bridged. 
If it be material, bow does a thing so destitute of analogy 
to mind get into the mind ? If it be neither spiritual 
nor material, but a tertium quid different from both 
mind and matter, what, in the name of sense, is it? 
The only answer is, Quid ? 

4. It may be contended that the existence of a rep- 
resentative image is not an hypothesis which is framed 
to account for the fact of an external world, but that it 
is delivered as a fact by consciousness ; and the fact of a 
representing image being given, we must infer the thing 
represented, as when we see an image reflected in a mir- 
ror we infer the existence of the object which caused 
the reflection. To this it is replied : 

(1.) If an appeal be taken to the common sense of 
mankind to determine what the deliverance of conscious- 
ness is, the answer would be to the fact of an external 
world. 

(2.) Consciousness delivers the fact of a mental mod- 
ification when a mental modification exists, and in those 
cases in which the external object is not now and here 
present to our facilities, delivers also the fact of a convic- 
tion or belief that the vicarious image truly represents a 
past event or an absent object. But when the external 
object is now and here related to our faculties, conscious- 
ness does not deliver to us the fact of an image which 
represents the object, but the object itself. We are no 
more conscious of a representing image than we are, in 
an act of visual perception, of the image of the object 
upon the retina of the eye. The hypothesis of repre- 
sentative perception obliterates the distinction between 



54 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

perception and the imagination. They become the same 
faculty, sustaining different relations : at one time to the 
present, and at another time to the past or the future, 
or the absent, or the possible, object. 

(3.) Our belief that the image reflected in a mirror 
supposes an object which causes the reflection will, upon 
examination, be found to rest upon experience. If we 
had never discovered the fact by observation that the 
appearance in the mirror was simply a reflection, we 
would believe that appearance to be an underived phe- 
nomenon — a real object, and not an illusion. So is it 
with children and animals, until their first impressions 
are corrected. Thus, on the supposition that we medi- 
ately apprehend an external object through its image 
mirrored in the mind, we could never know the repre- 
sentative character of the image, without having first 
been cognizant of the object imaged. We may be con- 
scious of an image as a fact, but we could never know it 
as an image of something else, without first having 
known that which is imaged. Representative knowledge 
pre-supposes, and is grounded in, presentative. How 
can that be re-presented which was never presented ? 
We cannot image anything of which, in whole or in part, 
we have had no previous intuition. The wildest fancies 
of the poet, the lunatic, the dreamer, are but compounds 
of intuitions or percepts. To adopt the hypothesis of 
representative perception, consequently, is to suppose a 
knowledge without foundation or reason — to put the 
child before the mother, the effect before the cause. This 
single consideration is fatal to that hypothesis. 

This conclusion, which was reached independently of 



The Eatuke of Consciousness. 55 

Hamilton's discussion of the question, is clenched by an 
argument, in which he proves that the representative 
perceptionist reasons in a circle. "On this theory/' he 
remarks, "we do not know the existence of an external 
world, except on the supposition that that which we do 
know truly represents it as existing. The hypothetical 
realist cannot, therefore, establish the fact of the ex- 
ternal world, except upon the fact of its representation. 
This is manifest. We have, therefore, next to ask him, 
how he knows the fact that the external world is actually 
represented. A representation supposes something rep- 
resented, and the representation of the external world 
supposes the existence of that world. E"ow, the hy- 
pothetical realist, when asked how he proves the reality 
of the outer world, which, ex hypothesis he does not 
know, can only say that he infers its existence from the 
fact of its representation. But the fact of the repre- 
sentation of an external world supposes the existence of 
that world; therefore, he is again at the point from 
which he started. He has been arguing in a circle. There 
is thus a see-saw between the hypothesis and the fact ; 
the fact is assumed as an hypothesis ; the hypothesis ex- 
plained as a fact ; each is established, each is expounded 
by the other. To account for the possibility of an un- 
known external world, the hypothesis of representation 
is devised ; and to account for the possibility of represen- 
tation, we imagine the hypothesis of an external world." 
To put the case more sharply : When we ask the rep- 
resentative perceptionist, How do you know the ex- 
istence of the external world ? he answers, Through a 
mental image which represents it. When we ask him, 



56 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

How do you know that the image is representative ? he 
replies, Because there is an external world which it rep- 
resents. He knows the external world as existing be- 
cause it is represented; he knows it as represented be- 
cause it exists. 

I cannot forbear appending a condensed statement of 
another of Hamilton's arguments which he puts in the 
form of dilemmas : 

Either the mental image represents a real external 
world, or it does not. If it does not, the result is pure 
idealism. But as that is abjured by the representative 
perceptionist, the first alternative must be accepted. 

The question, then, is, What determines the mind to 
represent the external world which, ex hypothesis it does 
not immediately perceive ? 

Now, again, either the mind blindly determines it- 
self to this representation, or, it is determined by some 
intelligent cause different from itself. The former sup- 
position is irrational. The mind would represent that 
of which it knows nothing, and that would violate all 
the laws of representation. The latter supposition im- 
plies a supernatural and miraculous element. But this 
is unphilosophical, provided a simpler explanation is 
possible. Tha't is furnished by natural realism, which 
accepts the datum of consciousness that we immediately 
know the external world as a phenomenal reality. 

If the hypothesis of representative perception be dis- 
carded, we are shut up to the doctrine of an immediate 
perception of the external world. For there are only 
two conceivable alternatives: either we mediately, or 
we immediately, know the external world. If the latter 



The Nature of Consciousness. 57 

be true, perception is its immediate knowledge. There 
is no other power to which that knowledge can be at- 
tributed. 

The remaining question is, whether in perceiving the 
external world we are conscious of it. Reid maintained 
the view that we are conscious, not of the external ob- 
ject itself, but of the act of perception by which we im- 
mediately know it — that is, he held that consciousness 
is limited to mental phenomena. The argument of Sir 
W. Hamilton in opposition to this view is twofold: 
First, the knowledge of relatives is one: in being con- 
scious of one term of the relation — perception, we must 
be conscious of the other term — the object perceived; 
secondly, we could not in consciousness discriminate an 
act of perception by which we know a certain object 
from another act of perception by which we know a dif- 
ferent object, unless at the same time we were conscious 
of the object itself which impresses a specific type, a 
particular denomination, upon the perceiving act. How 
otherwise, for example, could we be conscious of the 
perception of a man as contradistinguished to the per- 
ception of a horse were we not also conscious of the man 
and of the horse ? 

Concerning these arguments of Hamilton I would say 
that they are valid if regarded as ad hominem — that is, 
as founded upon the supposition of Reid and his fol- 
lowers, that there is a difference between the act of per- 
ception and the consciousness of that act. But upon 
Hamilton's own principles they must be considered un- 
necessary, and as appearing to concede the truth of the 
doctrine that perception of the external world and con- 



58 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

sciousness of it are not one and the same. Granted that 
the hypothesis of representative perception is incorrect, 
the true answer to the Reidian position is that in per- 
ceiving the external world we are conscious of it — that 
the act of external perception is the act of consciousness. 
This view is enforced by Hamilton's principles and by 
the nature of the case. 

1. Hamilton held that consciousness and immediate 
knowledge are convertible, A collection of sentences 
scattered through his lectures will sufficiently evince 
this fact. "I may here also observe, that, while all phil- 
osophers agree in making consciousness an immediate 
knowledge, some, as Reid and Stewart, do not admit 
that all immediate knowledge is consciousness." "Con- 
sciousness is an immediate knowledge of the present. 
We have, indeed, already shown that consciousness is 
an immediate knowledge, and, therefore, only of the 
actual or now-existent." "Consciousness and immediate 
knowledge are thus terms universally convertible; and 
if there be an immediate knowledge of things external, 
there is consequently the consciousness of an outer 
world." "Perception, or the consciousness of external 
objects, is the first power in order ... Is our per- 
ception, or our consciousness, of external objects medi- 
ate or immediate ?" As, according to Hamilton, per- 
ception is an immediate knowledge of the external world, 
so must be consciousness, with which he uses perception 
convertibly. 

JSTow, if we are conscious of the perceiving act, Ave are 
conscious either of a mediate knowledge of the external 
world, or of an immediate knowledge of it. If of a 



The Nature of Consciousness. 59 

mediate knowledge, the whole doctrine of Hamilton and 
of the Scottish school is contradicted. The hypothesis 
of representative perception is admitted. If of an 
immediate knowledge, it follows that we immediately 
know that we immediately know the external world. 
For consciousness is an immediate knowledge, and so is 
perception. To be conscious that we perceive is, there- 
fore, immediately to know an act of immediate knowl- 
edge. But this is inadmissible, for — 

(1.) It would be excluded by the law of Parcimony. 

(2.) We would have a regression of acts of immediate 
knowledge ad infinitum. For if one act of immediate 
knowledge may be known by another act of immediate 
knowledge, so may that other act. We could never reach 
an ultimate act. It is true that Ave may immediately 
know an act of mediate knowledge, but the same is not 
true of an act of immediate knowledge. It is autopistic, 
or rather self -revealing. We cannot go behind it. And 
this is perfectly clear upon Hamilton's principles, for 
we have seen that he uses consciousness and perception 
convertibly. If, then, w T e may be conscious of an act of 
perception, we may be conscious of an act of conscious- 
ness, and we would strike a regression of conscious- 
nesses — an absurdity which no man has more emphati- 
cally condemned than Hamilton himself. 

(3.) If we are conscious of an act of perception, we 
would have a percept of a percept. For it is on all hands 
admitted that consciousness is a perception of our sub- 
jective phenomena. A subjective phenomena, therefore, 
of which we are conscious, or which we perceive, is a 
percept. But the act of perception by which we ap- 



60 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

prehend the external world is a subjective phenomenon 
of which we are conscious, or which we perceive, and is, 
therefore, a percept. At the same time it terminates 
upon an external object as its percept. It is manifest, 
therefore, that if we are conscious of a perceiving act, 
we would have a percept of a percept, which is absurd. 
To put the case differently, we would have a perceiving 
act terminating upon a perceiving act, For an act of 
consciousness is a perceiving act, and the perception of 
an external object is also a perceiving act. To be con- 
scious, therefore, of the perceiving act is to have a per- 
ceiving act terminating upon a perceiving act as its ob- 
ject — a perception of a perception, which is absurd. 

The argument might be pursued farther, but enough 
has been said to show that upon the supposition of the 
falsity of the hypothesis of representative perception, 
external perception, by which we immediately know the 
external world, and consciousness are one and the same, 
so far as relation to that world is concerned — that is, 
consciousness also includes the perception of the inner 
world. 

The conclusion, consequently, has been reached, that 
consciousness,- as the complement of internal and exter- 
nal perception, is the faculty of immediate knowledge, 
or, briefly, the presentative faculty. 

III. To this view sundry objections may be urged: 

1. It may be objected that it is novel and exceptional. 
But, were this objection pertinent, it would not be proved 
that the view is, on that account, untrue. Unless ulti- 
mate truth in every department of psychological inquiry 
has been attained, it might happen that even a new con- 



The !N"atuee of Consciousness. 61 

elusion would be true. The objection, however, does not 
lie, except in the sense that it is false. Sir W. Hamil- 
ton again and again makes express statements, and still 
more frequently gives implicit intimations, which in- 
volve the doctrine here maintained. The fact that he 
did not formulate it in so many words, and that some- 
times his utterances conflict with it, cannot invalidate 
his substantive maintenance of it. The conclusion 
enunciated in this discussion is really the logical result 
of his views. It was to be expected that as he over and 
over asserts the convertibility of the terms, conscious- 
ness, perception and immediate knowledge, some one 
would come after him, who, agreeing with him in that 
respect, would formally take the ground that conscious- 
ness, perception and immediate knowledge are one and 
the same. 

2. It may be objected, that the spheres of conscious- 
ness and perception are not coincident, that conscious- 
ness does what perception does not, or vice versa. This 
could only be substantiated were the differentiating cir- 
cumstances pointed out, by which one is distinguished 
from the other. Until that is clearly done, the objection 
has hardly a nominal value. Stat nominis umbra. I 
confess to an inability to detect the peculiar quality. 

3. It will be objected by those who maintain Hamil- 
ton's position upon that point that the view here con- 
tended for makes consciousness a special faculty. Ham- 
ilton had, in the nineteenth century, no superior as a 
philosopher, and deserves to be held in profound admi- 
ration for his imperial genius and his massive erudi- 
tion; nor need it detract from his brilliant reputation 



62 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

to perceive that he sometimes enunciated views that are 
inconsistent with each other. Perhaps no thinker has 
ever lived who was always self -consistent, or who fore- 
saw all the consequences that could be logically deduced 
from his doctrines, some of which would have been re- 
jected by him had they been brought to his attention. 
Locke, could he have forecast the logical use which was 
made of some of his principles by Condillac and the 
French encyclopaedists, and of others in an exactly op- 
posite direction by Berkeley and ultimately by Hume, 
would have modified statements from which, on the one 
hand, sensationalism and materialism could be devel- 
oped, and, on the other, idealism and scepticism. Could 
Jonathan Edwards, who indignantly denied that God 
was the proximate producer of sin, have seen his specu- 
lations in regard to philosophical necessity in the hands 
of Emmons logically employed to prove that blasphemy, 
falsehood and theft are due to the efficiency of God he 
might have endeavored to render impossible a result 
which his piety abjured. And if Sir William Hamil- 
ton himself, who held to faith in God, could have antici- 
pated that from his persistent adherence, even under 
challenge, to a technical phraseology which denied the 
knowledge of the Infinite, there would spring the athe- 
istic doctrine of the utter unknowableness of God, he 
would probably have recoiled from the exaltation of im- 
mediate knowledge as the only proper knowledge, and 
the depression of mediate as scarcely worthy of the 
name. A history of the inconsistencies and shortsight- 
edness of great thinkers would afford a lesson suited to 
humble the pride of the human intellect. 



The Eatuke of Consciousness. 63 

In holding that consciousness is not a special faculty 
Hamilton was inconsistent with himself. Eegarcling 
him as, on the whole, teaching a true doctrine in relation 
to the nature, office and authority of consciousness, and 
as, in particular, presenting as able a defence of the 
wrong doctrine in opposition to the view that conscious- 
ness is a special faculty as can be furnished, I shall at- 
tempt to show that he is inaccurate, both in his didactic 
statements, and in his polemic argument, touching the 
question. 

(1.) Let us gather up some of his didactic statements. 

"Consciousness comprehends every cognitive act; in other 
words, whatever we are not conscious of, that we do not know." 

"Whatever division, therefore, of the mental phenomena may be 
adopted, all its members must be within [ ! ] consciousness itself, 
which must be viewed as comprehensive of the whole phenomena 
to be divided; far less should we reduce it, as a special phe- 
nomenon, to a particular class. Let consciousness, therefore, 
remain one and indivisible, comprehending all the modifications — 
all the phenomena, of the thinking subject." 

"Such is the highest or most general classification of the 
mental phenomena, or of the phenomena of which we are conscious. 
But as these primary classes are, as we have shown, all included 
under one universal phenomenon — the phenomenon of Conscious- 
ness — it follows that Consciousness must form the first object of 
our consideration." 

"Consciousness cannot be defined; we may be ourselves fully 
aware what consciousness is, but we cannot, without confusion, 
convey to others a definition of what we ourselves clearly appre- 
hend. The reason is plain. Consciousness lies at the root of all 
knowledge. Consciousness is itself the one highest source of all 
comprehensibility and illustration." 

"Is there any knowledge of which we are not conscious? Is 
there any belief of which we are not conscious? There is not — 
there cannot be; therefore, consciousness is not contained under 
either knowledge or belief, but on the contrary knowledge and 
belief are both contained under consciousness." 



64 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

"We know; and we know that we know: these propositions, 
logically distinct, are really identical; each implies the other. 
The attempt to analyze the cognition I know, and the cognition / 
know that I know, into the separate energies of distinct faculties, 
is therefore vain." 

"Consciousness ... is not one of the special modes into 
which our mental activity may be resolved, but the fundamental 
form — the generic condition of them all. Every intelligent act is 
thus a modified consciousness ; and consciousness a comprehensive 
term for the complement of our cognitive energies." 

These statements, taken by themselves, are not free 
from ambiguity and indefiniteness ; but tho two which 
follow bring out into light the position of which we are 
in quest. In antagonizing Reid's doctrine that we are 
not conscious of the external world, and in professedly 
attempting to prove that consciousness is not a special 
faculty, Hamilton says: "Is consciousness the genus 
under which our several faculties of knowledge are con- 
tained as species — or, is consciousness itself a special 
faculty coordinate with, and not comprehending, these V 
He maintains the former alternative. This is definite 
enough. The other passage is as follows: "We distin- 
guish consciousness from the special faculties, though 
these are all only modifications of consciousness — only 
branches of which consciousness is the trunk," etc. This 
is also clear. 

Hamilton must be acquitted of the charge which has 
been preferred against him, that he represents conscious- 
ness as a genus, including under it as species not only 
cognitions, but feelings and volitions. His language is 
so sweeping as apparently to justify this opinion. But 
this is not his meaning. He held that we cannot feel 
without being conscious that we feel ; that we cannot will 



The Eatttbe of Cois"sciousiS"ess. 65 

without being conscious that we will. That, however, 
is very different from reducing feeling and willing 
under the generic denomination of cognition. But it 
can hardly be disputed that he makes consciousness the 
genus under which every kind of cognition, nay, every 
cognitive faculty, is included as a species. It is on this 
account that he refuses to consciousness the designation 
of a special faculty, and claims for it a generic charac- 
ter. It is this doctrine which it is difficult to reconcile 
either with his catholic teaching or with fact. 

First, if consciousness be a genus under which the 
special faculties of cognition are included — the trunk 
of which they are the branches, it follows that it is a 
generic faculty; for to include faculties as species under 
a genus which is itself not a faculty would be inad- 
missible. Further, this being granted, the generic 
faculty, consciousness, as confessedly discriminated 
from the feelings and the will (or, to use Hamilton's 
distribution, the conative powers), must be admitted to 
be a special faculty contained with them under the high- 
est genus, the mind itself, the bond of unity of all the 
mental faculties. 

Secondly, if we confine the question rigidly within 
the sphere of cognition, of knowledge, it will still be 
evident that consciousness must be regarded as a spe- 
cial faculty. When Hamilton declares consciousness to 
be a genus containing under it all the faculties of know- 
ledge, he must mean either all the faculties of immediate 
knowledge, or all the faculties of knowledge, immediate 
and mediate. 

If all the faculties of immediate knowledge, the re- 



66 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

duction is, on his own principles, inconceivable, or 
rather impossible. For there is no faculty of immediate 
knowledge but consciousness. It is the sole, the ex- 
haustive specimen of immediate knowledge, as Mel- 
chizedek, in the olden time, was the only occupant of his 
order of priesthood. It is the solitary instance of pre- 
sentative knowledge. It has already been proved that 
it is the complement of internal and external perception. 
This Hamilton, as has been shown, explicitly admits. 
There is no dispute about the question, whether con- 
sciousness and internal perception are one and the same ; 
and upon the question, whether it is identical with ex- 
ternal perception, Hamilton, against Reid, maintains 
that it is : in perceiving the external world we are con- 
scious of it. It is, then, ex hypothesis impossible to re- 
duce internal and external perception as powers of im- 
mediate knowledge under consciousness as a genus ; and 
if you could, the very reduction would demonstrate con- 
sciousness to be a faculty of immediate knowledge spe- 
cifically distinguished from the faculties of mediate 
knowledge. 

But if it be insisted upon with Reid and Stewart, who 
are in this respect exceptional thinkers, that conscious- 
ness and external perception are different, it would fol- 
low that as consciousness is universally admitted to be 
an immediate knowledge of mental phenomena, and ex- 
ternal perception is by those philosophers affirmed to be 
the faculty by which we immediately know the external 
world, each would be a faculty of immediate knowledge, 
terminating upon its own peculiar objects, and neither 
would contain the other under it. They would be sepa- 



The Nature of Consciousness. 67 

rate, but co-ordinate faculties included under the 
generic faculty of knowledge. Thus we would be again 
shut up to the concession that consciousness is a special 
faculty. 

It is evident that there is no other power of immediate 
knowledge which, as specific, can be contained under 
consciousness as generic. It is, in that sphere, itself 
both genus and species. It fills the ordo of immediate 
knowledge. If one might be allowed to take an illus- 
tration from the division of ecclesiastical offices, con- 
sciousness is to immediate or presentative knowledge 
what the deacon is to the distributing office. There is 
no genus, distributing officers, under which he is con- 
tained as species; there is no species, distributing of- 
ficers, which is contained under him as genus. He ex- 
hausts the order of distribution. 

If by the affirmation, consciousness is "the genus 
under which our several faculties of knowledge are con- 
tained as species," all the faculties of immediate and 
mediate knowledge are intended, the first obvious con- 
sideration is that, if the preceding argument is valid, 
immediate knowledge must be excluded; and then the 
only question remaining is, Are the specific faculties of 
mediate knowledge included under consciousness as a 
genus ? 

The very statement of this question enforces a nega- 
tive answer. It is evident that knowledge is a genus 
containing under it the species, immediate knowledge 
and mediate knowledge. Here the generic attribute, 
knowledge, is included in both the species, while they 
are distinguished from each other by the qualities of im- 



68 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

mediateness and mediateness. But it would be utterly 
illogical to make immediate knowledge a genus contain- 
ing under it mediate knowledge as a species, since the 
generic quality, immediacy, would be included in the 
species, which would then be an immediate-mediate 
knowledge; and that would invest the species with con- 
tradictory qualities. Now, it is admitted by Hamilton 
that consciousness is immediate knowledge. Conse- 
quently, it cannot contain under it faculties of mediate 
knowledge. The reduction ought to be : the generic cog- 
nitive faculty, containing under it the species, faculty of 
immediate knowledge, and faculties of mediate know- 
ledge. The definition of consciousness then would be 
the faculty of immediate knowledge; knowledge being 
the generic quality, and immediate the specific differ- 
ence. 

But Hamilton contends that we cannot have mediate 
knowledge accruing from a representation, a concept, a 
belief, without being conscious of the representation, 
the concept, the belief. Very true ; but the distinction is 
between the means of knowing and the objects known. 
By means of a representation we know the thing repre- 
sented, of a concept the thing conceived, of a belief the 
thing believed. We know by consciousness the represen- 
tation, the concept, the belief, for they are mental phe- 
nomena, but we do not know by consciousness the things 
represented, conceived, believed. Take his own posi- 
tion — knowledge is a relation. The relation between 
consciousness and the mental phenomena, representa- 
tion, concept, belief, is immediate knowledge; the rela- 
tion between these mental acts and their appropriate 



The Eatuee of Consciousness. 69 

objects is mediate knowledge. Unless, then, immediate 
knowledge can embrace mediate, consciousness cannot 
include mediate knowledge. Let Hamilton's explana- 
tion of memory serve as an example. We Lave a mental 
image of a past fact. We know the mental image by 
consciousness ; this is immediate knowledge. We know 
the past fact by the representative image. This is 
mediate knowledge : it is belief, not consciousness. The 
knowledge is due to memory, not to consciousness ; it is 
an act of representative, and not of presentative, know- 
ledge. 

It may be said — and this is the only other supposition 
I can conceive to be possible — that though conscious- 
ness be not the mediate knowledge itself, yet we are con- 
scious of the knowledge as a fact. But this cannot be ; 
for were we conscious of the knowledge, we would be 
conscious of both terms of the relation implied in the 
knowledge — namely, the representing image and the 
past fact represented. Hamilton holds that the know- 
ledge of relatives is one. He correctly contends, how- 
ever, that we are not conscious of the past fact. If so, 
we are not conscious of the knowledge. The same in- 
divisible knowing subject knows the whole case in two 
ways — presentatively and representatively — distinct in 
themselves, but reduced to the unity of knowledge. And 
the spontaneous transition from the presentative to the 
representative act is so magically swift, that the distinc- 
tion between the two can only be reflectively appre- 
hended. 

The formula, "I know and I know that I know are 
the same," needs to be seriously qualified. As unquali- 



70 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

fled it is not true. If immediate knowledge is meant, 
the formula amounts to this : I immediately know that 
I immediately know; I am conscious that. I am con- 
scious. This, as tautological, is out of the question. I 
immediately know that I mediately know — that would 
hold good, under proper restrictions. For, I am con- 
scious of a representation which guarantees a reality 
out of consciousness : I am conscious of a belief by which 
I mediately know substance, occult force and God. But 
if the meaning be, that my representative knowledge and 
my faith knowledge are the contents of consciousness, 
one is compelled to demur. Mediate knowledge cannot 
be a part of the contents of immediate. This conducts 
us to the consideration of — 

(2.) Hamilton's polemic defence of his doctrine that 
consciousness is not a special faculty. 

There is really but one argument which he employs 
to prove his point. It is, that in being conscious of any 
cognitive act or operation we must be conscious of the 
object about which it is concerned. Let us hear his own 
statement of the case. 

" If consciousness," says he, "has for its object the cognitive 
operations, it must know these operations, and, as it knows these 
operations, it must know their objects: consequently, conscious- 
ness is either not a special faculty, but a faculty comprehending 
every cognitive act; or it must be held that there is a double 
knowledge of every object — first, the knowledge of that object by 
its particular faculty, and second, a knowledge of it by conscious- 
ness, as taking cognizance of every mental operation. But the 
former of these alternatives is a surrender of consciousness as a 
coordinate and special faculty, and the latter is a supposition not 
only unphilosophical, but absurd. . . . The whole question, 
therefore, turns upon the proof or disproof of this principle, 'that 
to be conscious of the operation of a faculty is, in fact, to be 



The Nature oe Consciousness. 71 

conscious of the object of that operation;' for if it can be shown 
that the knowledge of an operation necessarily involves the know- 
ledge of its object, it follows that it is impossible to make con- 
sciousness conversant about the intellectual operations to the 
exclusion of their objects. And that this principle must be ad- 
mitted, is what, I hope, it will require but little argument to 
demonstrate." 

This argument, I shall endeavor to show, is contradic- 
tory to Hamilton's principles, and in itself inconclusive. 

First, the argument is from the universal to the par- 
ticular: All knowledge of an operation involves the 
knowledge of its object ; consciousness is a knowledge of 
an operation; therefore the consciousness of an opera- 
tion involves the knowledge of its object. But it is evi- 
dent that the term knowledge in the major premise is 
equivocal. The meaning may be : All immediate know- 
ledge of an operation involves the immediate knowledge 
of its object; or, all immediate knowledge of an opera- 
tion involves the mediate knowledge of its object. Let 
us examine each alternative in the order stated. 

All immediate knowledge of an operation involves the 
immediate knowledge of its object. This is exactly the 
same as consciousness of an operation involves the con- 
sciousness of its object, for Hamilton restricts immedi- 
ate knowledge to consciousness, maintains that there is 
no other immediate knowledge than consciousness ; and 
in this he is clearly right. The two propositions, there- 
fore, are identical. One cannot be treated as universal, 
the other as particular. The class and the individual 
asserted to be in it are one and the same. There is, 
therefore, no argumentative progress. There is simply 
the affirmation that consciousness or immediate know- 



72 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ledge of an operation involves the consciousness or im- 
mediate knowledge of its object. The argument is 
naught; the affirmation remains to be proved. This is 
really Hamilton's position, and it can be disproved. 

The other alternative is, that all immediate knowledge 
of an operation involves the mediate knowledge of its 
object. Now, since immediate knowledge and conscious- 
ness, according to Hamilton, are the same, the proposi- 
tion amounts to this : that consciousness of an operation 
involves the mediate knowledge of its object. This is 
true — in the sense that consciousness of an operation 
conditions and conduces to the mediate knowledge of its 
object. But, although this is exactly what Hamilton 
uniformly teaches, it is not what he means here. He 
means more. He expressly says, as we have seen : "If 
consciousness has for its object the cognitive operations, 
it must know these operations, and as it knows these 
operations, it must know their objects" ; and also : "to 
be conscious of the operation of a faculty is, in fact, to 
be conscious of the object of that operation." Nothing 
could be more explicit. Consciousness not only condi- 
tions the mediate knowledge of the object of every opera- 
tion, but it "involves" it, "comprehends" it, coincides 
with it. 

This, then, is the principle for which Hamilton con- 
tends in his polemic against Reid : The consciousness of 
an operation is the consciousness of its object. As he ap- 
plies this principle to the concrete cases of perception, 
imagination and memory, it behooves that each of these 
applications should be considered ; and — 

In the first place, as to external perception. The as- 



The Nature of Consciousness. 73 

sertion, in this particular case, is, that the consciousness 
of the operation of perception is the consciousness of 
the object perceived. This has already been criticised 
in the foregoing discussion, and, therefore, little need 
be said about it now. There is no consciousness of the 
operation of perception. Consciousness is precisely that 
operation. Otherwise, as Hamilton's doctrine is that 
we are conscious of the external object, we would have 
a consciousness of a consciousness, which cannot be al- 
lowed. The argument, as against Eeid, ought to have 
been that in the very operation by which we perceive the 
external object we are conscious of it. This position he 
could have sustained upon the ground of Reid's own 
doctrine in opposition to the hypothesis of representa- 
tive perception — namely, that nothing intervenes be- 
tween the mind and the external object. For, upon the 
supposition that consciousness and perception are dif- 
ferent, it must be admitted, either that the operation of 
perception intervenes between the conscious mind and 
the external object, or that the mind must pass through 
the state of consciousness to reach the operation of per- 
ception. On either hypothesis there would be no imme- 
diate knowledge of the external object. 

The question, then, upon Hamilton's principles is 
non-existent, whether the consciousness of the operation 
of perception is the consciousness of the object of that 
operation. 

In the second place, as to the imagination. The affir- 
mation is, that in being conscious of an operation of the 
imagination we are conscious of its object — that is, in 
being conscious of a mental image we are conscious of 



74 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

the thing imaged. There are two cases in regard to 
which this question may he raised: First, when we 
imagine an object which has no reality, such as a hippo- 
gryph or a centaur; secondly, when we imagine an ob- 
ject which has reality, such as a well-known city, or 
river, or mountain. Strangely enough, Hamilton con- 
siders only the first of these cases. "Now," says he with 
reference to this case, "nothing can be more evident than 
that the object and the act of imagination are identical. 
Thus, in the example alleged, the centaur imagined and 
the act of imagining it are one and indivisible." That 
is, as there is no objective reality answering to the 
image, the image is all. Of course, in being conscious 
of the image we are conscious of the object imaged, for 
the image is the object imaged, the object imaged is the 
image. To say, then, that in being conscious of the 
image we are conscious of the object imaged, as though 
one act of knowledge "involved," "comprehended" an- 
other act of knowledge, would be the same as if one, 
gazing upon the tower of London, should say : In being 
conscious of the tower I am conscious of the tower. 
When a phenomenon is purely a "subject-object," or 
purely an "object-object," to say that the consciousness 
of it is the consciousness of its object, is to employ an 
unmeaning affirmation. 

But it is pertinent to inquire, whether in being con- 
scious of the image of a real thing we are conscious of 
the real thing itself. Hamilton does not argue this spe- 
cial case. If he had done so, he might have urged that 
the knowledge of relatives is one ; therefore, in knowing 
the image we must know the real object imaged. Here 



The Natuke of Consciousness. 75 

the ambiguity would have to be -unmasked. What know- 
ledge is spoken of ? Is it meant that having an immedi- 
ate knowledge of the image we have an immediate 
knowledge of the object imaged ? That is not possible ; 
for imagination of an object supposes the object to be 
not now and here present, and immediate knowledge is 
of an object now and here present. A contradiction 
emerges ; for it is affirmed that immediate knowledge is 
always of an object now and here present, but that this 
immediate knowledge is of an object not now and here 
present. Now, what is true of immediate knowledge is 
true of consciousness. It would, then, involve a contra- 
diction to say that in being conscious of an image now 
and here present we are conscious of the object imaged, 
which is not now and here present. There must be 
some other sense in which the maxim, the knowledge of 
relatives is one, is applicable. 

That other sense is, that in immediately knowing the 
image we mediately know the real object imaged. That 
is true, and is undoubtedly Hamilton's doctrine, when 
he speaks apart from this criticism of Reid's hypothesis. 
But mediate knowledge is not consciousness. While, 
therefore, we are entitled to say, that in knowing the 
image we know the real object imaged, we cannot say 
that in being conscious of the one we are conscious of 
the other. That would be to make immediate knowledge 
the same as mediate, presentative knowledge the same 
as representative. 

A passage from Hamilton himself will confirm this 
argument. 

" I call up," he remarks, "an image of the High Church [a 
cathedral edifice in Edinburgh]. Now, in this act, what do I 



76 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

know immediately or intuitively; what mediately or by repre- 
sentation? It is manifest that I am conscious, or immediately 
cognizant, of all that is known as an act or modification of my 
mind, and, consequently, of the modification or act which con- 
stitutes the mental image of the cathedral. But as, in this opera- 
tion, it is evident that I am conscious, or immediately cognizant, 
of the cathedral as imaged in my mind; so it is equally manifest 
that I am not conscious or immediately cognizant of the cathedral 
as existing. But still I am said to know it; it is even called the 
object of my thought." 

Yes; but thought is a mediate knowledge. What, 
therefore, I mediately know by thought, I do not imme- 
diately know by consciousness. I am conscious of the 
thought, not of the object thought. 

In the third place, as to the memory. Hamilton re- 
futes Eeid's position that memory is an immediate 
knowledge of the past. But Hamilton contends that con- 
sciousness and immediate knowledge are convertible. 
Therefore, one would infer we cannot be conscious of 
the past. How, then, can Hamilton hold that conscious- 
ness, as a generic faculty, includes a knowledge of past 
objects remembered? But does he hold this? Let us 
hear him. 

" If," he observes, "our intellectual operations exist only in 
relation, it must be impossible that consciousness can take cogni- 
zance of one term of this relation, without also taking cognizance 
of the other. Knowledge, in general, is a relation betiveen a sub- 
ject knowing and an object known, and each operation of our 
cognitive faculties only exists by relation to a particular object — 
this object at once calling it into existence, and specifying the 
quality of its existence. It is, therefore, palpably impossible that 
we can be conscious of an act without being conscious of the object 
to which that act is relative. This, however, is what Dr. Reid and 
Mr. Stewart maintain. They maintain that I can know that I 
know without knowing what I know — or that I can know the 



The Nature of Consciousness. 77 

knowledge without knowing what the knowledge is about; for 
example, that I am conscious of perceiving a book without being 
conscious of the book perceived — that 1 am conscious of remem- 
bering its contents, without being conscious of these contents 
remembered — and so forth. The unsoundness of this opinion must, 
however, be articulately shown," etc. 

Here Hamilton puts, unaccountably puts, perception 
and memory upon the same footing. We perceive the 
contents of a book, therefore we are conscious of them. 
Most certainly ; for the contents of the book are now and 
here before us. We gaze upon them — we have an in- 
tuition, an immediate, a presentative knowledge of 
them. Likewise, argues Hamilton, we remember the 
contents of a book, therefore we are conscious of them. 
Most certainly not, for the contents of the book are not 
now and here present. We do not gaze upon them — we 
have not an intuitive, an immediate, a presentative 
knowledge of them; therefore, we are not conscious of 
them. What we are conscious of is the mental repre- 
sentation of the contents of the book, and through that 
representation we know, not presentatively and imme- 
diately, but representatively and mediately, those con- 
tents; we are not conscious of them. That Hamilton 
himself maintained this view will be evinced by the fol- 
lowing passage, extracted from the very discussion in 
which he attempts to show that consciousness is not a 
special faculty : 

"What are the contents of an act of memory? An act of mem- 
ory is merely a present state of mind, which we are conscious of, 
not as absolute, but as relative to, and representing, another state 
of mind, and accompanied with the belief that the state of mind, 
as now represented, has actually been. I remember an event I 
saw — the landing of George IV. at Leith. This remembrance is 



78 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

only a consciousness of certain imaginations, involving the con- 
viction that these imaginations now represent ideally what I 
formerly really experienced. All that is immediately known in 
the act of memory is the present mental modification; that is, 
the representation and concomitant belief. Beyond the mental 
modification we know nothing; and this mental modification is 
not only known to consciousness, but only exists in and by con- 
sciousness. Of any past object, real or ideal, the mind knows and 
can know nothing, for, ex hypothesi, no such object now exists; or 
if it be said to know such an object, it can only be said to know it 
mediately, as represented in the present mental modification." 

This is a convincing statement, and it makes the 
explicit declaration that, in heing conscious of an opera- 
tion of memory, we are not conscious of the object of 
that operation. If this be so, what of the thesis con- 
tended for : that consciousness of the operation of any 
cognitive faculty involves the consciousness of its ob- 
ject .? 

Might Hamilton have intended by the object of an 
operation to designate not the really existing external 
object, but the object as subjectively contained in the 
mental representation — the object representing the real 
external object represented? This supposition is op- 
posed by the fact that he applied the principle to per- 
ception, and it -is perfectly certain that he did not hold 
that in the operation of perception there is contained a 
mental object representing the real external object. 
Think of the prince of natural realists holding such a 
view ! Further, if that supposition is made concerning 
the representative faculties, it could not relieve the dif- 
ficulty. For the subjective object contained in the 
mental operation is the whole ideal matter of the opera- 
tion. It is impossible to separate between the repre- 



The Natuke of Consciousness. 79 

sentative operation and the ideal, representing object, 
They are identical. To say, then, that in being con- 
scions of the operation we are conscious of its object, 
would be to say that in being conscious of the operation 
we are conscious of the operation. That surely would 
not prove consciousness to be a generic and all-compre- 
hending faculty ! 

The possible supposition, that Hamilton may have 
meant that we are conscious of the mediate knowledge 
furnished by the operation of a faculty of mediate know- 
ledge, has already, to some extent, been considered. Let 
us now test it by the mediate knowledge of the Infinite, 
of God. Can we be conscious of that knowledge ? Hamil- 
ton contends that we cannot think God, as infinite. 
Of course, then, we cannot be conscious of him, as in- 
finite. But he also holds that we mediately know him, 
as infinite. How ? We believe in him, as infinite. Xow, 
of this belief, as a mental phenomenon, we are conscious. 
Does it follow that we are also conscious of the mediate 
knowledge itself ? It is clear that this knowledge can- 
not exist without involving its object. The object is the 
very thing about which it is concerned. The Infinite 
Being — to speak reverently — is its object-matter. Think 
away that, you annihilate the knowledge. To be con- 
scious of the knowledge, therefore, is to be conscious 
of God, as infinite. But that Hamilton denies, and justly 
denies. Hence, consciousness of the belief, as an act or 
operation which is phenomenal, does not involve a con- 
sciousness of the knowledge which it furnishes. 

Let us come down to the finite, and also test Hamil- 
ton's position by. belief in human testimony. We read 



80 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

the Commentaries of Caesar. We believe the testimony, 
and have a mediate knowledge of the facts reported. 
Now three things happen. First, we have, as grounded 
upon the author's descriptions, representative images 
of the battles as past facts. Through them we have a 
mediate knowledge of those facts. Are we conscious of 
the battles ? Have we a conscious 'knowledge of them ? 
'No. We are conscious only of the representations 
through which we mediately know. Secondly, we be- 
lieve in the existence of Julius Caesar. In this case, we 
can have no trustworthy representative image. Our 
knowledge of Csesar is furnished by a belief mediated 
through testimony. Are we conscious of the knowledge 
of the great commander ? If so, as he is the object- 
matter of the knowledge, we are conscious of Caesar. 
That is out of the question, if the knowledge that con- 
sciousness furnishes is immediate, presentative, intui- 
tive. Is Julius Caesar now and here present to us ? He 
is not even imaged. He is believed in. Thirdly, those 
who have never been at Rome know the city, but not 
through a representative image of a thing formerly pre- 
sented. I never saw Rome. Yet it is at present exist- 
ing. Were I to visit it I would be conscious of it. Now 
I am not even conscious of an image of it. How, then, 
do I know its existence ? Believing in testimony I 
mediately know it. I am conscious that I thus believe, 
that I thus mediately know Rome. I am not conscious 
of the knowledge itself, for I am not conscious of Rome, 
its object-matter; and will probably never be conscious 
of it, as I never expect to go Romeward ! Here, then, 
we have past events, a non-existent person, and an ex- 



The Nature of Consciousness. 81 

isting place, of neither of which we have conscious 
knowledge. Our knowledge is a faith-knowledge medi- 
ated through testimony. 

The last defence which may be resorted to is, that 
there is a distinction between a conscious knowledge and 
a consciousness of knowledge. This, however, is an 
incompetent distinction, for the reason that wherever 
consciousness exists there are but two terms : conscious- 
ness itself and the object of consciousness ; and the rela- 
tion between the two is knowledge, which can be no other 
than consciousness. To say that there may be a con- 
sciousness of a knowledge without conscious knowledge 
is to say that there may be a knowledge of a knowledge 
without a knowledge of the object of knowledge. 

To take opposite ground from that which has been in 
this discussion maintained is to make consciousness the 
generic cognitive faculty; that is, the reason or intelli- 
gence, and to attribute to it all the functions of cogni- 
tion. It would be distributable into the faculty of im- 
mediate knowledge, the faculty of mediate knowledge, 
and the faculty of laws or first principles. It would, by 
virtue of this reduction, immediately know, and would 
also represent, think, and believe. This cannot be true 
if consciousness is the faculty or power of immediate 
knowledge ; and that it is, is Hamilton's doctrine — a doc- 
trine which can be established upon solid grounds of 
reason. On this supposition, it cannot be true, for, it is 
clear that the essence of the genus, immediate know- 
ledge, could not descend into such species, said to be con- 
tained under, it as representative knowledge, thought- 
knowledge, and faith-knowledge. 



82 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

Is there, then, any knowledge, possessed by us, of 
which we are not conscious ? The answer is : None, of 
which it cannot be said that we are conscious that we 
know; much, very much, of which it can be said that 
we are not conscious of what we know. In his sweeping 
denial of this Hamilton's consistency and discrimina- 
tion alike failed him. He confounded consciousness 
with mediate knowledge. We cannot, it is true, be con- 
scious without being conscious of the object known in 
consciousness ; but we can mediately know, without be- 
ing conscious of the object mediately known — such as 
cause, substance, occult force, infinity, God. Other- 
wise, we would have a double knowledge of objects medi- 
ately known — namely, a mediate knowledge of them by 
the particular faculties appropriate to them, and an im- 
mediate knowledge of them by consciousness ; a thing 
which Hamilton himself pronounces not only unphil- 
osophical, but absurd. Either consciousness is one kind 
of knowledge, or it comprehends all kinds of knowledge. 
It cannot be both. Hamilton affirms that it is both. Be- 
tween the contradictories I am compelled to elect that 
which makes consciousness a specific knowledge, and 
reject that which makes it generic. The one indivisible, 
personal subject which knows, knows immediately 
and knows mediately. It were folly to postulate two 
specific kinds of knowledge, and reduce them to unity 
upon one of the species as generic. Both authenticate 
themselves, resting ultimately upon the trustworthiness 
of that fundamental nature, which is at once the pro- 
duct of God, and the expression of his veracity. We are 
conscious, we represent, we think, we believe, — all these 



The Eatuke of Consciousness. 83 

cognitive processes are brought into unity upon the 
generic faculty of cognition, and the validity of them all 
is guaranteed by faith in the immutable truth of him 
who created the human soul. 

Before this discussion is closed two things must be 
signalized : 

1. Although it has been maintained that conscious- 
ness is a specific, and not a generic, faculty of cognition, 
it is not intended that, strictly speaking, it is to be coor- 
dinated as a species with the specific faculties of repre- 
sentation, thought, and belief ; but rather as the faculty 
of immediate knowledge, with the faculty of mediate 
knowledge, the latter being distributable into the special 
faculties of mediate knowledge — the representative fac- 
ulty, the thinking faculty, the believing faculty. 

2. While it has been contended that consciousness is 
not a generic faculty, comprehending all the other facul- 
ties, of cognition ; it is also maintained that, as the fac- 
ulty of immediate, presentative, intuitive knowledge — 
the complement of internal and external perception, it 
sustains a catholic relation to all the others. It is the 
generic condition of their operations. It is the faculty 
of experience, the original observer, the office of which 
is to furnish the materials which are employed by the 
other faculties. It is to them what psychology and 
physical science are to philosophy. It explores the 
fields of the inner and outer worlds, investigates, notes 
and registers facts. It is, indeed, the organ of the 
psychologist and the scientist. As i mm ediate know- 
ledge it is the condition necessary to the development of 
all mediate knowledge. 



84 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

The conclusion has thus' been reached that conscious- 
ness and perception are one and the same ; that they are 
different names for the same special faculty — the 
faculty of immediate or presentative or intuitive know- 
ledge, sustaining a common relation to all the other 
faculties, and furnishing the necessary condition of their 
operation. 



THE AUTHORITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS. 



rFl HE authority of consciousness depends upon its 
JL trustworthiness, and the question of its trust- 
worthiness resolves itself into the question of its verac- 
ity. 

When we speak of the authority of consciousness, two 
things are included: first, the authority of conscious- 
ness as the immediate knowledge, the perception, of 
phenomenal facts, internal and external ; secondly, the 
authority of the necessary inferences derivable from 
those facts. These inferences are given in conscious- 
ness, are testified to by it as facts, but the authority of 
the inferences themselves rests upon the fundamental 
laws of thought and belief. These laws are, in the first 
instance, beneath consciousness. They are developed 
into activity by the empirical conditions furnished by 
consciousness. They then formally express themselves 
in the necessary inferences derived from the data of 
consciousness. The inferences are the explicit evolu- 
tion into actual thoughts and beliefs of what was pre- 
viously contained implicity in the phenomenal facts of 
consciousness. The authority of consciousness, there- 
fore, is comprehensively the authority of both the phe- 
nomenal facts delivered and the inferences logically de- 
ducible from them. 

85 



86 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

The question is similar to that of the authority of the 
Bible. Of its express statements we are conscious. As 
facts they are authoritative, but the good and necessary 
consequences which are deducible from the explicit state- 
ments of the Scriptures are of equal authority with the 
statements themselves. 

I proceed briefly to indicate the proofs of the veracity, 
and consequently the authority of consciousness, con- 
sidered in this comprehensive sense. 

1. There can, from the nature of the case, lie no ap- 
peal from the clear deliverances of consciousness. If 
we take such an appeal, it must be made to another con- 
sciousness, or to nothing. If to a second consciousness 
deeper and more authoritative than the first, we are 
again compelled to appeal to a third for confirmation of 
its data. It is plain that we strike the path of a regres- 
sion of consciousnesses which must be ad infinitum. As 
this is absurd, nothing is left us. but to rely upon the 
first clear deliverances of consciousness as possessed of 
decisive authority. 

2. Consciousness is the testimony of God in our na- 
ture. It is fundamental, and it must be admitted by all 
but professed atheists that the foundations of our mental 
constitution were laid by our Maker. If, then, con- 
sciousness could be supposed to lie, we would suppose 
that it was intended by God to lie ; that our nature was 
constructed by him as an organ of falsehood. This is 
contradictory to all our apprehensions of the divine 
character. To say that our nature may have been the 
product of a malign creator would be to adopt the old 
Manichsean absurdity, and to contradict the principles of 



The Authobity of Consciousness. 87 

theism — principles which are enforced by reason itself. 
Rejecting that hypothesis, we must believe that our na- 
ture was created by the God of truth ; and, as conscious- 
ness is a radical power of that nature, that it expresses 
the veracity of God — that it is his testimony uttered by 
our mental constitution. 

3. If consciousness could be false, the root of our 
nature would be falsehood. We would be radical liars. 
The whole development of our constitution would be in 
the direction of falsehood. To advocate such a view 
would be to approve lying as a natural and therefore 
justifiable habit — a procedure which the moral sense of 
mankind would not tolerate, ISTor can it relieve the dif- 
ficulty to take the ground that consciousness may not 
always, but only sometimes, deceive. For if it were 
false in one respect, it would be universally untrust- 
worthy. A prevaricating witness can never be trusted : 
falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus. 

4. The practice of mankind, the structure and rela- 
tions of society, the business and conduct of every-day 
life, all depends upon and suppose the veracity of con- 
sciousness. This is, in itself, sufficient to settle the ques- 
tion. Even the nihilist could not carry out any plan 
upon a contrary supposition. 

5. If the testimony of consciousness were false, all 
ground of certainty would be gone. All beliefs and doc- 
trines would be reduced to absolute indifference. Why 
should Hume have argued to prove the perfect absence 
of certitude from human knowledge? Were not, ac- 
cording to his hypothesis, his own grounds of argument 
destitute of all certainty? He refuted his own scepti- 



88 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

cism. The veracity of consciousness gone, the whole 
fabric of human knowledge is demolished, as well scien- 
tific as philosophical, religious as natural. For 

(1.) Observation through the senses — the organ of 
science — is alone trustworthy, because founded on the 
veracity of consciousness. 

(2.) This is still more obvious in regard to phil- 
osophy. If it canot rely upon consciousness, it could 
have no beginning, and what is called philosophy would 
have an end. It would be zero. 

(3.) The same is true of religion. So far as it is 
natural, it is grounded in the testimony of conscious- 
ness in regard to the facts of our religious nature, and so 
far as it is supernatural, it supposes the deliverances of 
consciousness as to the evidences of divine revelation, and 
its trustworthiness as to the statements of the Scriptures. 

6. Ultimately, our reliance upon consciousness, as 
the immediate knowledge of phenomenal existence, is 
grounded in a law of belief imbedded in the very founda- 
tions of our mental structure. To doubt its veracity, 
therefore, would be to discredit the fundamental prin- 
ciples of our nature. We would doubt ourselves, we 
would doubt everything. Universal scepticism would 
result; all ground of the certainty of knowledge would 
be swept away. The vacuity of nihilism would remain 
— not even a vast and howling wilderness, for there 
would be no wilderness, and if there were, there would 
be nothing to make it howl. Hamilton remarks truly : 
"A fact of consciousness is thus, — that whose existence 
is given and guaranteed by an original and necessary be- 
lief." 



The Authority of Consciousness. 89 

7. So far I have been able heartily to subscribe to 
what Hamilton has delivered in regard to the authority 
of consciousness ; but there is one of his positions which 
does not command my assent, if I have correctly appre- 
hended it. He will be allowed to state it in his own 
words. In his Lectures he says : 

" The facts of consciousness are to be considered in two points 
of view; either as evidencing their own ideal or phenomenal exist- 
ence, or as evidencing the objective existence of something else 
beyond them. A belief in the former is not identical with a 
belief in the latter. The one cannot, the other may possibly, be 
refused. In the case of a common witness, we cannot doubt the 
fact of his personal reality, nor the fact of his testimony as 
emitted; but we can always doubt the truth of that which his 
testimony avers. So it is with consciousness. We cannot possibly 
refuse the fact of its evidence as given, but we may hesitate to 
admit that beyond itself of which it assures us. I shall explain 
by taking an example. In the act of External Perception, con- 
sciousness gives, as a conjunct fact, the existence of Me or Self as 
perceiving, and the existence of something different from Me or 
Self as perceived. Now the reality of this as a subjective datum — 
as an ideal phenomenon, it is impossible to doubt without doubting 
the existence of consciousness, for consciousness is itself this fact; 
and to doubt the existence of consciousness is absolutely impos- 
sible; for as such a doubt could not exist, except in and through 
consciousness, it would, consequently, annihilate itself. We should 
doubt that we doubted. As contained — as given, in an act of con- 
sciousness, the contrast of mind knowing and matter known cannot 
be denied. 

" But the whole phenomenon as given in consciousness may be 
admitted, and yet its inference disputed. It may be said, con- 
sciousness gives the mental subject as perceiving an external 
object, contradistinguished from it as perceived; all this we do 
not, and cannot, deny. But consciousness is only a phenomenon; 
the contrast between the subject and the object may be only 
apparent, not real; the object given as an external reality may 
only be a mental representation, which the mind is, by an unknown 
law, determined unconsciously to produce, and to mistake for 



90 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

something different from itself. All this may be said and be- 
lieved, without self-contradiction; nay, all this has, by the 
immense majority of modern philosophers, been actually said and 
believed." 

The same distinction is thus maintained in his Notes 
to Reid: 

" There is no skepticism possible touching the facts of con- 
sciousness in themselves. We cannot doubt that the phenomena 
of consciousness are real, in so far as we are conscious of them. 
I cannot doubt, for example, that I am actually conscious of a 
certain feeling of fragrance, and of certain perceptions of color, 
figure, etc., when I see and smell a rose. Of the reality of these, 
as experienced, I cannot doubt, because they are facts of conscious- 
ness; and of consciousness I cannot doubt, because such doubt 
being itself an act of consciousness, would contradict, and, conse- 
quently, annihilate itself. But of all beyond the mere phenomena 
of which we are conscious, we may — without fear of self-contra- 
diction, at least — doubt. I may, for instance, doubt whether the 
rose I see and smell has any existence beyond a phenomenal exist- 
ence in my consciousness. I cannot doubt that I am conscious of 
it as something different from self; but whether it have indeed 
any reality beyond my mind — whether the not-self be not in truth 
only self — that I may philosophically question. In like manner, I 
am conscious of the memory of a certain past event. Of the 
contents of this memory, as a phenomenon given in consciousness, 
skepticism is impossible. But I may by possibility demur to the 
reality of all beyond these contents and the sphere of present 
consciousness." 

The language here employed is not perfectly clear, at 
least not so clear as to exclude all uncertainty touching 
Hamilton's meaning. It may be said that he distin- 
guishes between the 'possibility and the validity of doubt 
in regard to the things which consciousness testifies to. 
While it is possible to doubt in relation to these things, 
it is not legitimate to entertain the doubt. It is possible, 
but not valid. The possibility of such doubt, it is urged, 



The Authoeity of Consciousness. 91 

is proved by the fact that so many philosophers have 
actually indulged it. This, however, is not conclusive. 
The question is in regard to the mind in its regular 
condition, and in the normal exercise of its faculties. 
There have been some who professed to doubt their own 
existence, and, of course, the existence of consciousness 
itself. If possibility of doubt be made the measure of 
uncertainty, all things are uncertain — the existence of 
ourselves, of the universe, of God. Absolute scepticism 
is not impossible, for there have been avowed Pyrrhon- 
ists in modern as well as in ancient times. 

A mind that violates its own laws may do anything, 
may adopt the wildest and most senseless vagary. The 
grotesque fancy of centaurs resulted in the belief of an 
actual battle between Hercules and those impossible ex- 
istences. What is impossible to a sane mind is possible 
to an insane; and the argument is not concerned about 
possibilities to a disordered intellect. A man may pre- 
tend to deny the existence of the external world, but if 
he persist, in the attempt to accomplish the impossible, 
the conclusion must be that, like Fichte, he will be to 
himself "but the dream of a dream." One may doubt 
his inability to fly to the moon, but he would only prove 
that in that respect he is a lunatic. It is true that it is 
possible for him to doubt his inability to perform the 
feat, but only as, quoad hoc, a crazy man. 

To say, then, that it is impossible to doubt the fact 
that consciousness testifies, but possible to doubt that to 
which it testifies, is to take a position concerning which 
there may be dispute. The distinction between the cer- 
tainty of the existence of consciousness and the certainty 



92 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

of its deliverances vanishes, if the existence of conscious- 
ness itself is susceptible of doubt. This, however, does 
not seem to be all that Hamilton's language conveys. It 
implies that the knowledge of the things to which con- 
sciousness testifies is less certain than the knowledge 
that consciousness actually testifies. The degree of cer- 
tainty is less in one case than in the other. This sup- 
poses that the testimony delivered by consciousness is 
not attended with the highest degree of certainty. It 
is against this position that objection is now offered. 

(1.) Consciousness never infers. It is the occasion 
of numerous and most important inferences ; itself never 
produces them. It is not an inferring faculty. It is at 
this point that Hamilton, usually the sure-footed ana- 
lyst, trips. He grounds the possibility of doubt in re- 
gard to the testimony of consciousness in the supposi- 
tion that it is sometimes inferential. We may not doubt 
the phenomenal contents of consciousness, but we may 
the inferences from those contents. "In the act of ex- 
ternal perception," he says, "consciousness gives, as a 
conjunct fact, the existence of me or self as perceiving, 
and the existence of something different from me or 
self as perceived. Now the reality of this, as a subjec- 
tive datum, as an ideal phenomenon, it is impossible to 
doubt, without denying the existence of consciousness, 
for consciousness is itself this fact." This he clearly 
proves, and then goes on to observe: "But the whole 
phenomenon as given in consciousness may be admitted, 
and yet its inference denied." This means, as he pro- 
ceeds to explain, that the direct testimony of conscious- 
ness to the phenomenon is undeniable, but its inferential 



The Authority of Consciousness. 93 

testimony that the phenomenon is external to the me or 
self is disputable. The direct testimony is to the phe- 
nomenal existence, the indirect or inferential is to the 
distinction between the Ego and the external world, to 
the antithesis between the subject knowing and the ob- 
ject known. This accords with the special view which 
he elsewhere maintains, that in every act of external per- 
ception, a "judgment" is furnished by consciousness af- 
firming a contrast between the mind and the material 
object. 

Sir William's doctrine of the nature and office of con- 
sciousness cannot be harmonized with this position, and 
it is a doctrine which is characterized by truth, and 
places the Scottish philosophy as expounded by himself 
in advance of previous systems. Consciousness is equiva- 
lent to immediate knowledge; it is the faculty of pre- 
sentative knowledge. Its office, its sole office, is to give 
phenomena. It is the observer of facts. This being 
its province, it never thinks, judges, compares, reasons. 
Consequently inference, both mediate and immediate, 
lies out of its field. This must be made by other powers, 
by the faculties of thought and belief. Hamilton is not 
consistent with himself in admitting that the inference 
of the distinction between the self and an external ob- 
ject is furnished by consciousness. That judgment ac- 
companies the testimony of consciousness to the phe- 
nomenal facts of the mind and those of matter, but is 
not the product of consciousness itself. The judgment, 
in the form of a special, immediate inference, is en- 
forced by a fundamental law of belief, an a priori prin- 
ciple of our mental constitution, developed into exercise 



94 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

by the conditions of consciousness — that is, by the em- 
pirical knowledge of phenomenal facts afforded by con- 
sciousness. 

If, therefore, it were conceded to Hamilton that this 
inference, and others like it, may possibly be doubted, 
that would not affect the authority of consciousness as 
absolutely trustworthy in all its testimony concerning 
phenomenal facts. Hamilton's general doctrine holds 
good, without exception, that it is impossible to doubt 
the testimony of consciousness to a phenomenal fact 
without doubting the existence of consciousness itself. 
For how is it possible to apprehend consciousness itself 
as a fact without apprehending the object of which we 
are conscious. Annihilate the object, you annihilate 
consciousness. Consciousness is an actual, not a poten- 
tial, knowledge. It is immediate knowledge actually ex- 
isting. Think away the object immediately known, you 
think away the immediate knowledge. 

It remains, therefore, that the knowledge of the things 
to which consciousness testifies is of the same degree of 
certainty as the knowledge of the fact that conscious- 
ness testifies. The authority of consciousness, in its 
sphere of immediate knowledge, is unimpeachable — it 
is absolute. 

(2.) While it is true that the inferences derived from 
the facts presented in consciousness are not made by 
consciousness, but by other faculties, we are entitled not 
only to affirm the certainty of the knowledge which con- 
sciousness directly communicates, but to hold that good 
and necessary inferences from the facts of conscious- 
ness are of equal validity with the facts themselves. The 



The Authoeity of Consciousness. 95 

knowledge attending these necessary inferences, al- 
though mediate, is possessed of certainty equal to the 
immediate knowledge involved in consciousness. It is 
a maxim of the highest value, and one universally ad- 
mitted, that necessary inferences from original proposi- 
tions or facts are of equal validity and authority with 
the propositions or facts from which they are derived. 
In this class must be placed the inference from the phe- 
nomenal facts presented in consciousness to the ex- 
istence of our souls, of the material universe, and of 
God. The knowledge thus attained is the consumma- 
tion of conscious, immediate knowledge, the crown and 
glory of its development. By faith we climb up the 
ladder of consciousness, with its foot on earth, to God, 
to heaven, to immortality. 

8. The inquiry may be raised whether the veracity of 
consciousness may not have been impaired by the fall 
of man into sin. It may be said that, although the 
essential constituents of his nature were not destroyed 
by the fall, they were impaired, and that consciousness 
may have shared in the damage that was inflicted by the 
revolutionary force of sin. This, I think, cannot be 
maintained. 

( 1. ) The fact of sin could not discharge man from his 
obligation to obey God. The sense of legal obligation 
could not be obliterated. Otherwise the perception of 
guilt would have been destroyed. But the divine Ruler 
could not have left himself without a witness in the 
human constitution. That witness is precisely conscious- 
ness. It bears true testimony to the fact of crime, and 
thus justifies the retributive measures of the divine gov- 



96 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ernment to the transgressor himself, measures which, 
without such a testimony, would have only the force of 
mechanical inflictions. 

(2.) Whether what is done by man be right or wrong, 
consciousness as the unerring observer certifies the fact. 
A witness may lie upon the stand, but his consciousness 
tells the truth in bearing witness to the lie as a fact. 
Conscience, through the influence of a false understand- 
ing or of corrupt emotions, may render a wrong decision 
in a concrete case, but consciousness testifies to the wrong 
decision as a fact. 

The fall obliterated from man's nature the separate 
quality of holiness, but the essential power of conscious- 
ness remained as the knowledge of sin. It survived the 
storm which wrecked the spiritual qualities of the soul, 
an unerring witness alike to the guilt of man and the 
justice of God. This alone could ground the conviction 
in the breast of transgressors that their punishment is 
inflicted in righteousness. Take away the veracity of 
consciousness, and you remove the fidelity of memory, 
and so the procedures of violated law and penal justice 
would be reduced to the arbitrariness of mere brute 
force. They "might crush, but they could not convince. 



COSMOTHETIC IDEALISM 



THIS title is here adopted in order to align the 
theory with other forms of idealism. The theory 
is also designated "by the following names : Representa- 
tive perception, hypothetical realism, and hypothetical 
dualism. The reason for these different titles was fur- 
nished in a preceding discussion. The arguments of Sir 
William Hamilton in refutation of this theory I regard 
as masterly and convincing. It is now proposed to pre- 
sent a condensed statement of his arguments, with oc- 
casional interpolated notes, which will he indicated hy 
square brackets, and to add some reflections of my own. 
I. It is urged that nothing can act where it does not 
exist ; therefore the mind cannot immediately act upon 
matter. The immediate cognition of matter is impos- 
sible. Hence there must be an intervening something. 
Answer : 

1. Consciousness testifies to our immediate percep- 
tion of matter. Its incomprehensibility makes nothing 
against this deliverance. 

2. The objection proves too much, and is, therefore, 
worthless. 

(1.) It would make the termination of volition on 
our muscular organism impossible. But consciousness 
and facts alike affirm it. 

97 



98 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

(2.) It would prove all action and re-action in the 
universe impossible. That, also, is contradictory to 
facts. It would limit each thing to the sphere of its 
own existence. 

3. The objection, while denying transitive efficiency 
to mind, concedes it to matter. The ideal image is the 
result of the projection of the material object into the 
mind, or at least of some influence of that object. The 
two must come together in some way, and the cosmo- 
thetic idealist assigns more activity to matter in ef- 
fecting the mysterious junction than to mind, which is 
absurd. 

II. It is contended that mind and matter are sub- 
stances of the most opposite nature; but what immedi- 
ately knows must be of a nature analogous to that which 
is known. Answer : 

The latter assumption is purely gratuitous, and, there- 
fore, needs no labored refutation. We know nothing, a 
priori, of the capacities of mind. But our a posteriori 
experience contradicts the assumption that mind, as out 
of analogy to matter, cannot immediately cognize it. 
The testimony of consciousness is clear upon this point. 

III. It is urged that mind can only know immedi- 
ately that to which it is immediately present ; but as ex- 
ternal objects cannot come into the mind, nor the mind 
go out to them, they can be known only mediately 
through some representative object whether that object 
be in the mind and of it, or in the mind but not of it. 

There have been several methods of meeting this ob- 
jection : 

1. It has been denied that external objects cannot 



COSMOTHETIC IDEALISM. 99 

come into the mind; that is, it has been affirmed that 
the j may come into the mind. [This Hamilton pro- 
nounces absurd, and so brushes it aside along with Ser- 
geant's argument: I know the very thing; the thing is, 
therefore, in my act of knowledge ; that act is in my un- 
derstanding; therefore the thing is also.] 

2. It has been asserted that the mind actually goes 
out to the external object. Vision, it has been held, is a 
perceptive emanation from the eye. This was a doctrine 
of Empedocles, the Platonists, the Stoics, Alexander the 
Aphrodisian, Euclid, Ptolemy, Galen and Alchindus. 
Lord Monboddo pushed it out to absurdity: The mind 
must exist where it acts ; it acts beyond the body ; there- 
fore it exists out of the body in the distant object. 
[Hamilton only states the hypothesis.] 

3. The view has been held, as by Reid and Stewart, 
that though the mind neither sallies out to the external 
object, nor does it intrude into the mind — though they 
are not present to each other — the agency of God comes 
in to effect an immediate perception by the mind of the 
external object. This is almost identical with the Car- 
tesian doctrine of occasional causes or divine assistance. 
Answer : 

(1.) This is a mere hypothesis, not a statement of 
fact. 

(2.) It assumes an occult principle ; it is mystical. 

(3.) It is hyperphysical : brings in a deus ex machina. 

(4.) It is out of harmony with Reid and Stewart's 
doctrine of an immediate perception of the external 
world. [Here Hamilton introduces his own view as to 
the external object which is immediately perceived, in 

Loire. 



100 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

order to show that the doctrine of the immediate percep- 
tion of the external world is not unintelligible. What- 
ever may be thought of this view, it does not contribute 
anything to the solution of the philosophical riddle, how 
the mind conies in contact with external objects. The 
chasm is not bridged. The bodily organism is matter, 
however near the mind it is held to be. 

Here also Hamilton argues against the localization of 
the mind. But it makes no difference whether it be 
seated at a point of the brain or occupy the whole body. 
If it be in the body, it is localized. Either the soul is 
somewhere or it is nowhere. If somewhere, it is in a 
place; if nowhere, it is non-existent. The Deity alone 
is in no place ; that is, as contained in it or restricted to 
it. The doctrine of the illocalitas of spirit is unin- 
telligible. It certainly is not, as finite, ubiquitous. Pass 
with as much speed as possible from point to point of 
space, it must, at any given instant of time, be at a cer- 
tain point and nowhere else. Is not that to be local- 
ized ?] 

IV. Hume's view was that external objects are only 
images. A table, for example, diminishes as we recede 
from it with our gaze fixed upon it. This is answered 
by referring to the real object perceived ; that is, one in 
contact with the organ of sense. [I have grave doubts in 
regard to the competency of this answer of Hamilton's, 
and venture to suggest another. Let a man be stationed 
at the table, while another recedes from it. To him who 
keeps his stand at the table it retains its bulk unchanged. 
It cannot, therefore, actually diminish. The explana- 
tion is to be found in the laws of light and vision. The 



COSMOTHETIC IDEALISM. 101 

illustration given proves it absurd to hold that the ex- 
ternal object perceived really changes with our dis- 
tance from it. It is impossible that the table could be to 
one man actually of one size and to the other actually of 
another. To say that the table is but an image to both 
men will not answer, for if a third man should dash the 
table to pieces with a hammer, there would be no im- 
pact of the hammer upon the image ; and that it is a 
reality independent of any image is proved by the possi- 
bility of its being broken to pieces by a hammer in the 
hands of a blind man who could have no image of it — 
might not even be previously in contact with it by touch, 
but be informed what place it occupied.] 

V. Fichte's argument is that the will must terminate 
on objects within the mind. Hence representative real- 
ities are in and of the mind. Answer : 

1. It is a pure assumption as to the termination of 
the will. 

2. ~No distinction is made between cognitions which 
move the will itself and other cognitions — the first re- 
specting the future, others the present. 

Arguments Against the Theory. 

1. It is unnecessary. This is proved from the grounds 
upon which the cosmothetic idealist would vindicate his 
rejection of the fact of consciousness — namely, the im- 
mediate cognition of the external object. 

(1.) It is not shown that the alleged fact of conscious- 
ness is impossible. 

(2.) The alleged incomprehensibleness of the datum 
of consciousness does not necessitate the representative 



102 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

hypothesis. The incomprehensibility of a fact of con- 
sciousness is no ground for its displacement by a sub- 
stituted hypothesis. Every ultimate fact of conscious- 
ness must, from the nature of the case, be incomprehen- 
sible. Every demonstration is deduced from something 
given and indemonstrable. 

(3.) But let it be supposed that the hypothesis is 
more comprehensible than the fact of consciousness; 
that would only shift back the difficulty which would 
have to be ultimately met. For a comprehensible fact 
cannot be ultimate. It must be explained by something 
preceding which grounds its comprehensibility ; and so 
on by regression until an ultimate fact of consciousness 
is reached, which ex necessitate, is incomprehensible. 

(4.) But the representative hypothesis is not, in real- 
ity, more comprehensible than the fact of consciousness ; 
that is, the immediate cognition of the external object. 
It maintains this incomprehensible position: that the 
mind can represent that of which it knows nothing. 
It supposes that there can be re-presentation where there 
has been no presentation. Further, the hypothesis, in 
this view, appears contradictory. The representative 
hypothesis — that of cosmothetic idealism — therefore, 
violates the first condition of a legitimate hypothesis — it 
is unnecessary, and, besides, explains nothing. It is an 
incomprehensible solution of an incomprehensible dif- 
ficulty. 

2. The hypothesis is self -destructive. It destroys the 
trustworthiness of consciousness, and so subverts the 
foundations of knowledge. Consequently, it annihilates 
itself. 



COSMOTHETIC IDEALISM. 103 

3. The hypothesis assumes the facts which it professes 
to explain. It invents an hypothesis to explain an 
hypothesis; and so revolves in a vicious circle. What 
are the facts which it assumes ? First, the external ob- 
ject as existing ; secondly, the mind knowing. For it is 
devised to explain the correlation of these facts. Now, 
when we ask the cosmothetic idealist, How do you know 
the existence of the external object? he answers, 
Through a mental image which represents it. When 
we ask him, How do you know that the image is repre- 
sentative? he replies, Because there is an external ob- 
ject which it represents. He knows the external object 
as existing because it is represented ; he knows the ex- 
ternal object as represented because it exists. To put 
the case still more compactly: The external object exists 
because represented ; it is represented because it exists. 
Verily, this is a circle. 

It amounts to this : He hypothecates the external ob- 
ject upon a representative image; and he hypothecates 
a representative image upon the external object. It is 
an hypothesis to explain an hypothesis, and must, there- 
fore, ramble round and round in a circle, in which it 
ever returns to the point from which it started. The 
fact is, that all which the hypothesis really affirms is 
the ideal image, and the logical result would be absolute 
idealism. 

[It gives no ground upon which we can know the ex- 
istence of the external world as different from ourselves. 
It only supposes it to exist, and that only by a vicious 
circle of hypothetical reasoning; unless it be admitted 
that it is legitimate to infer the existence of an object 



104 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

reflected in a mirror from the mirrored representation 
of it previously to an experience by which we verify the 
relation between the two. But as Hamilton does not dis- 
cuss this supposition, it will be reserved for considera- 
tion in the sequel.] 

Hamilton's fourth argument I omit, in consequence 
of some doubt as to its validity or, at least, its con- 
clusiveness, and pass on to 

5. The hypothesis excludes the fact to be explained 
from the sphere of experience. It thus violates another 
canon as to a legitimate hypothesis. All that it grounds 
in professed experience is a mental image. Of the ex- 
ternal object alleged to be represented we have, ex 
hypothesi, no empirical knowledge. [Remarks upon 
this point are also postponed in connection with the last 
which has been considered, as they seem to be closely re- 
lated.] 

6. The hypothesis is destitute of simplicity, and so 
furnishes another violation of the laws of a legitimate 
hypothesis. It must not depend on a subsidiary hypoth- 
esis ; must not involve anything hidden or supernatural. 
That would be to attempt the explanation of what is 
hidden by another thing which is hidden; to elucidate 
the natural by the supernatural. 

!N"ow, either the mental image represents a real ex- 
ternal world or it does not. If it does not, the result is 
pure idealism. But as that is abjured by the cosmo- 
thetic idealist, the first alternative must be accepted. 
The question then is, What determines the mind to rep- 
resent the external object, which, ex hypothesi, it does 
not immediately perceive ? 



COSMOTHETIC IDEALISM. 105 

Now, again, either the mind blindly determines itself 
to this representation, or it is determined by some in- 
telligent cause different from itself. 

The former supposition is irrational. The mind is 
said to represent that of which it knows nothing, and 
that infringes all the laws of representation. 

The latter supposition implies a supernatural and 
miraculous element, such as are suggested by the 
theories of Descartes and Leibnitz. 

But this is unphilosophical, provided a simpler ex- 
planation is possible. That is furnished by natural 
realism which accepts the datum of consciousness, that 
we know the external world by immediate perception of 
its phenomenal reality. 

Such is a sketch of Sir William Hamilton's argument 
in opposition to the theory of cosmothetic idealism or 
representative perception — an argument remarkable 
alike for its originality, its acuteness and its power. 

Some Additional Reflections. 

1. One great difficulty urged against natural realism, 
which affirms the immediate perception by mind of ma- 
terial phenomena, is that it is impossible that spirit can 
be brought into such a relation to matter as to suppose 
its immediate cognition of it. 

To this it may be replied that the argument proves 
too much, since it involves the denial of the intuition of 
matter by the divine mind. For the distance between 
God, a pure spirit, and matter is infinite. On the 
theory that the substance of matter is not identical with 
that of God, the question must arise in regard to his 



106 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

knowledge of matter as different from himself. And as 
it is universally admitted by theists that his knowledge 
is intuitive, and not mediate and indirect, whatever in- 
ability there may be on our part to comprehend the 
relation between him and matter, we must admit his 
immediate knowledge of it. The argument, therefore, 
proves too much, and is, consequently, invalid. But if 
we concede the immediate knowledge of matter by him 
who is pure Spirit, what difficulty is there in admitting 
the lesser supposition of an immediate knowledge of it 
by the human spirit ? 

2. It is assumed that as cognition is an immanent, 
and not a transitive act of the mind, to suppose the mind 
to act immediately upon matter is to suppose it to act 
out of itself; and that would be contradictory to the 
nature of knowledge and absurd. 

But why should the mind not act where itself is not ? 
Is it less active than matter is deemed to be ? One body 
influences another body by the attraction of gravitation, 
although the two are not in contact, but may be at a 
great distance apart. Now, either the force of gravita- 
tion is a property of matter or of spirit. If of matter, 
the denial to spirit of a power to act upon that which is 
not part of itself reduces it, in the scale of being and 
dynamical influence, to a place inferior to that of mat- 
ter, which is absurd. If of spirit, it is granted that 
spirit can act upon matter, and act upon' it immediately. 
The question of an external medium is not involved on 
one side or the other of this question. If this be so, the 
ground of the difficulty is removed. 

3. It is contended that in order that the mind should 



COSMOTHETIC IDEALISM. 107 

be immediately cognizant of matter the two should be 
analogous substances. 

(1.) The argument used above, derived from the di- 
vine knowledge of material reality, also applies here. 
Is there an analogy between the Infinite Spirit and mat- 
ter % 

(2.) The position necessarily leads to monism. God 
cannot act upon matter if it be different from himself 
as a Spirit. He and the universe are one substance. 
Pure idealism or pure materialism is the inevitable re- 
sult. Upon this principle the hypothesis of a represen- 
tative perception is utterly illogical. Matter can no 
more act upon spirit than spirit can be cognizant of 
matter. There is no interaction possible. Whence, 
then, the representative image ? If it be a mental modi- 
fication, how does it bring the mind into a near relation 
to matter ? It is mind still, and the gulf is impassable. 
If it be material, how does a thing so destitute of analogy 
to mind get into the mind ? If it be neither spiritual 
nor material, but a tertium quid, different from both 
mind and matter, what, in the name of sense, is it 1 

4. It may be maintained that the existence of a rep- 
resentative image is not an hypothesis which is framed 
to account for the fact of an external world, but that it 
is delivered as a fact by consciousness. But the fact of 
a representing image being given, we must infer the 
thing represented ; as, when we see an image reflected in 
a mirror, we infer the existence of the object which 
caused the reflection. 

To this it is replied : 

(1.) If an appeal be taken to the common judgment 



108 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

of mankind to determine what the deliverance of con- 
sciousness is, the answer would be instantly, would be, 
except where there is partisan zeal for an hypothesis, 
universally, to the fact of an external world, or, at least, 
to the immediate knowledge of an external world. 

(2.) Consciousness delivers the fact of a mental 
image, when a mental modification exists, and, in those 
cases in which the external object is not present atively 
related to our faculties, delivers also the fact of an in- 
tuitive conviction or belief that the vicarious image 
truly represents a past event, or an absent object. But 
when the external object is now and here related to our 
faculties, consciousness does not deliver to us the fact of 
an image which represents the object, but the object 
itself. The object is the percept. The hypothesis of 
representative perception obliterates the distinction be- 
tween perception and the imagination. They become 
the same faculty, sustaining different relations — at one 
time to the present, and at other times to the past, or 
the future, or the absent, or the possible, object. In 
short, the name representative perception is a solecism. 
It is as if we should speak of a seeing blind man, or of 
other sameness, or of white blackness. 

(3.) Our belief that the image reflected in a mirror 
guarantees an object which causes the reflection will, 
upon examination, be found to rest upon experience. 
If we had never discovered by observation that the ap- 
pearance in the mirror was simply a reflection, we would 
believe that appearance to be an underived phenomenon 
— a real object, and not merely an illusion. So is it 
with children and animals until their first impressions 



COSMOTHETIC IDEALISM. 109 

aru corrected. A child will at first hold out its hand to 
the other child in the glass, but soon learns that it is but 
an image of itself. I remember once taking a large, 
sagacious pointer-dog to a mirror under a pier-table and 
showing him his image. He instantly bristled up, 
growled, evinced every disposition to fight, but was evi- 
dently reluctant to tackle an animal which, like him- 
self, was preparing for battle, and was exactly his match. 
He was taken by the neck, encouraged to begin hostil- 
ities, and thrust up against the glass, when the explosion 
occurred. Surprised at the result, he deliberately 
walked to the rear of the table and looked between it 
and the wall to see if the other dog were there. Satis- 
fied by the reconnoissance, he at once became placid, and 
never afterwards could be cheated by the illusion in the 
glass. He had learned something by experience. 

On the supposition that we mediately apprehend an 
external object through its image mirrored in the mind, 
we could never know the representative character of the 
image without first having been cognizant of the thing 
imaged. We may be conscious of an image as a fact, 
but we could never know it as an image unless we had 
previously known that which is imaged. Recognition 
infers cognition; representative knowledge pre-sup- 
poses, and is grounded in, presentative. 1 We cannot 
image anything of which, in whole or in part, we have 
had no previous intuition. The wildest fancies of the 
poet and the lunatic are but compounds of presenta- 
tions. To adopt the hypothesis of representative per- 

1 To that conclusion my own reflections had led me, before 
Hamilton's argument had been read. 



110 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ception, therefore, is to suppose a knowledge without 
foundation or reason — to put the child before the 
mother, the effect before the cause. This single con- 
sideration is fatal to that hypothesis. 

We have here an instance, it may be added, in re- 
buttal of the frequently uttered opinion that meta- 
physics makes no progress. For a long time cosmothetic 
idealism was the common doctrine of philosophers. In 
establishing the truer view of the immediate knowledge 
of the external world the Scottish philosophy made a de- 
cided advance in developing the science of the human 
mind. 



BERKELEY'S IDEALISM. 1 



A SPLENDID edition of Bishop Berkeley's works 
was issued, in 1871, by Professor Alexander 
Campbell Fraser, the incumbent of the Chair of Logic 
and Metaphysics in the University of Edinburgh — the 
chair once illuminated by the genius of the illustrious 
Sir William Hamilton. The elaborate dissertations in 
which the accomplished editor expounds the bishop's 
idealistic system, and the fact that they have emanated 
from one who has succeeded the great exponent and de- 
fender of natural realism, have had the effect of calling 
attention afresh to the principles of Berkeley's phil- 
osophy. In proceeding to discuss them we deem it im- 
portant to furnish a brief preliminary statement of the 
main features of Berkeley's system : 

1. The denial of abstract ideas. 

2. The denial of the existence of matter as substance. 
There is no such thing as material substance. 

3. The denial of even the phenomenal existence of 
matter, separate from and independent of spirit : denial 
of natural realism. Material things have no reality in 
themselves. Whatever reality or casuality material 
things possess, is dependent and relative. 

4. Esse est percipi: the so-called material world de- 

1 Presbyterian Quarterly, July 1887. 
Ill 



112 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

pends for existence upon the perception of spirit. A 
thing exists only as it is sensibly perceived. 

5. Ideals, sensations, and sense-given phenomena are 
the same. The material or external world of these ideas, 
sensations or sense-given phenomena depends for ex- 
istence upon perception — that is the perception of spirit. 
"The existence of our ideas consists in their being per- 
ceived, imagined, thought on." 

6. These external things or ideas constitute a system 
of symbols which (1) furnish a medium of communi- 
cation between different spirits, (2) interpret to finite 
intelligence the being and casual efficiency of the In- 
finite Spirit. 

7. There is no real causality in the external world 
of ideas. The only relation between them is that of 
antecedence and sequence. 

8. The permanence of the sensible world of ideas is 
grounded to us in the fact that our present sensations 
are signs of the past and of the future. "Physical sub- 
stance and causality" (so-called) "are only the arbi- 
trarily constituted signification of actual sensations." — 
Fraser. "Substantiality in the material world is per- 
manence of co-existence among sensations. 
Causality of phenomena is permanence or invariable- 
ness among their successions." — Fraser. This per- 
manence of matter (so-called) is in God. Sensations 
and sensible things are neither permanent, nor efficient. 
"The sensible world consists of significant sensations in 
perpetual flux, and sustained by the divine reason or 
will." — Fraser. 

9. We now see what Berkeley meant by ideas. They 



Berkeley's Idealism. 113 

are what are ordinarily termed material things or phe- 
nomena. They are in the mind, but not of it. Their 
origin is subjective, but they become objective. Mate- 
rial phenomena are ideas objectified and externalized. 
What we call the law of nature is only the order of the 
succession of these ideas. 

10. God calls forth in us our ideas in regular order. 

11. Real ideas, that is, ideas externalized, do not de- 
pend on our will for their production. Imaginary ideas 
depend upon the will. Real or sense-ideas are caused 
by the Infinite Spirit. 

12. We are prepared to understand what Berkeley 
meant by externality. It is simply externalized ideas : 
not a phenomenal reality independent of the perception 
of spirit. 

13. What then is spirit ? Berkeley says : "The mind, 
spirit or soul is that indivisible, unextended thing which 
thinks, acts and perceives. . . . That which perceives 
ideas, which thinks and wills, is plainly itself no idea, 
nor like an idea. Ideas are things, inactive and per- 
ceived ; and spirits a sort of beings altogether different 
from them." — Hylas & Philonous. 

14. We are directly conscious of the substance of our 
spirits. This consciousness he sometimes denominates 
reflection : we know, he says, our souls by reflection. 

Thought, volition, perception, — these are properly 
constituents of the soul; they are in it and of it. But 
ideas, while they are in the soul as sensational impres- 
sions, are not of it. They are not elements which belong 
to its substance. They are not the self — the Ego. 

Berkeley distinguishes between real ideas and im- 



114 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

agined ideas. The real are phenomenal, sensible things ; 
the imagined are purely mental and subjective — mere 
entia rationis. Now it is important to notice his doc- 
trine of causality as applied to these two different sorts 
of ideas. The real, he contends, are not caused by us, 
but by the Infinite Spirit, who puts us in relation to 
them, or them in relation to us. The imagined are 
caused by ourselves. The nature of this causal relation 
between our minds and these imagined ideas he defines 
from the will. They are caused by the will. We can 
mentally construct, at will, unreal combinations of the 
real ideas which we have perceived. 

We must also notice his doctrine of the immediacy of 
our knowledge of real ideas or phenomenal and sensible 
things. He was not a hypothetical realist, but rejected 
the doctrine of representative perception. Between per- 
ception and these real ideas there is, according to him, 
no intervening modification of the mind, vicarious and 
representative of the so-called external reality — his real 
idea. We have an immediate knowledge of it by percep- 
tion. But while he cannot be ranked as a cosmothetio 
idealist or hypothetical realist it must not be inferred 
that he was a natural realist or absolute dualist. There 
is in his doctrine, as Prof. Eraser, the interpreter of 
his system, endeavors to show, a species of dualism, but 
it was not that of the Scottish school. It is merely the 
dualism of the conscious spirit and its own ideas, con- 
ceived as external phenomena. The existence of ma- 
terial things separate from and independent of spirit, 
it was the very point of his philosophy to deny. 

He is evidently to be classed with monists, who af- 



Berkeley's Idealism. 115 

firm the existence of but one substance, and as he con- 
tended that this one substance is spirit, he must be as- 
signed to the specific class of idealistic monists. 

Let us now group the features of his system as they 
have been enumerated, so as, if possible, to get a brief 
and comprehensive statement of his theory. If possible, 
we say, for any one who attempts to accomplish this will 
find himself balked by discrepancies and inconsistencies 
which it is difficult to harmonize, and which reveal the 
want of mature elaboration of the theory by its author 
himself. 

There is no such thing as matter, according to the or- 
dinary conception of philosophers and the common peo- 
ple. ~No material substance can be proved to exist. 
It is therefore to us nothing. Nor are the so-called 
phenomena of matter realities which have an indepen- 
dent existence as such. They depend for existence upon 
their being perceived by spirit : Esse est percipi — their 
very being is to be perceived. Abstract the perception 
of spirit from them, and they are zero. They are conse- 
quently ideas, not separate from the mind, but in it as 
impressed upon it through the media of sensations. In- 
deed, they are represented as sensations themselves. 
Phenomena, which are denominated external, are, there- 
fore, but objectified ideas or sensations. The mind gone, 
they are gone. But these ideas are not limited to any 
one spirit. They are related to the aggregate of finite 
spirits, and ultimately to the infinite Spirit, Finite 
spirits being supposed to be out of relation through per- 
ception to these real ideas or sensible phenomena, they 
continue to find the reason of their existence in the per- 



116 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ception of the omnipresent Spirit. In fact, they are 
creatively caused by God — are God's ideas. The uni- 
verse, consequently, is a collection of God's ideas. Who- 
ever, then, perceives the universe, or any part of it, per- 
ceives God's ideas, and has presented to him by the ordi- 
nary experience of the perceptive faculty incontestable 
evidence of the existence of God as an intelligent and 
omnipotent Spirit. For all phenomena constitute a 
symbolism of sense which is a medium of communica- 
tion between finite spirits, and which signifies to us the 
divine attributes. As we put together letters to form a 
word, so we collect these sensible symbols to spell out the 
great name of God. These external phenomena, thus 
systematized, and having their unity in their relation 
to the Infinite Spirit as caused by him, have no other 
coherence in themselves but that which springs from a 
divinely ordained antecedence and sequence. The only 
cause which operates in them and through them is that 
which originated them; and as God's ideas they meet 
their continuity and persistence alone in his immediate 
efficiency. 

It will be seen from this brief and necessarily inade- 
quate sketch of Bishop Berkeley's philosophical theory 
of idealism that his pious purpose — as he himself 
avowed it to be — in its construction, was to resist and 
overthrow the prevailing materialism of his times, and 
to vindicate the doctrine of God's existence, and of his 
immediate relation to the phenomenal universe as his 
product against the objections to it which materialists 
were wont to urge. It remains to be seen whether, in 
the prosecution of this laudable design, he did not go far 



Beekeley's Idealism. 117 

towards the opposite extreme of asserting, at least by 
logical consequence, an idealistic pantheism, which can- 
cels the difference between the Deity and his works, 
which makes God the universe and the universe God. 

In proceeding to consider the theory let us under- 
stand, at the outset, what are not the questions to be dis- 
cussed. 

First, it is not the question, whether any so-called 
material things actually exist as unperceived by some 
spiritual intelligence, whether any unperceived or un- 
perceivable matter exists. This cannot be made a ques- 
tion, since it may be that wherever matter in any form 
exists, there also finite spirits exist and are in percep- 
tive relation to it; and since it is certain that no ma- 
terial things can exist out of relation to God, as an om- 
nipresent spirit. 

Secondly, it is not the question, whether any finite 
thing can have the cause of its existence in itself. The 
existence of God being admitted, all matter (so-called) 
and all finite spirits must be regarded as caused by his 
infinite power. Separate being, as caused, they may 
have, but it is necessarily derived and dependent. 

Thirdly, it is not the question, whether the material 
system depends for continued existence upon spirit. 
Every opponent of materialism admits the fact that it 
depends for that existence upon God as the infinite 
Spirit, In this they all concur with Bishop Berkeley. 
They may differ from him as to the mode of the divine 
concursus and support, 

Fourthly, it is not the question, whether matter is an 
original and underived cause of any effects, whether it 



118 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

possesses an independent power to cause phenomenal 
changes. It may be a question whether matter (so- 
called) is endowed with properties which as second and 
subordinate causes are adapted to produce phenomenal 
changes, but it is not made a question in this discussion, 
whether it has the efficiency of a first and original cause. 
That the pure materialist may affirm, but its denial is 
here assumed. 

These, then, are not questions with which the present 
argument has to deal, and must consequently be thought 
away. What, then, are the questions about which it is 
concerned ? 

I. The first question which falls to be considered is, 
whether or not there be such a thing as material sub- 
stance. Bishop Berkeley denies that its existence can 
be proved, and explicitly affirms the contrary. It is one 
end of these remarks to evince the incompetency of his 
hypothesis. 

1. Berkeley begins by denying and ridiculing the 
alleged existence of what are termed abstract ideas. 
The substance of matter is one of these ideas. As there 
are no such things, there can be no material substance. 
It is a play upon words, a mere fancy and crotchet of 
philosophers. Now there are two kinds of ideas, de- 
nominated abstract, which are to be carefully distin- 
guished from each other. An oversight of the distinc- 
tion must involve the discussion in confusion. First, 
by the terms abstract idea is sometimes meant the idea 
or conception of a phenomenal quality which is com- 
mon to several individuals, while at the same time they 
possess other qualities which as peculiar distinguish 



Bekkeeey's Idealism. 119 

each of these individuals from the others. The question 
being, whether such a common quality can in thought 
be abstracted from its connection with others and made 
a separate object of contemplation, Bishop Berkeley at 
times takes the negative, and at others seems to admit the 
affirmative. His ordinary doctrine is, that there can be 
no such quality to which we can attach an idea. He 
contends that what we conceive is an individual thing, 
in the concrete, whatever it may be, and that we make 
that individual the standard with which we compare 
others in order to form a class. While pursuing this 
line of reasoning, he declares it impossible and ridicu- 
lous that there can be an abstract idea of a common 
quality in the sense of a quality containing in itself the 
general marks of different individuals. But, on the 
other hand, he sometimes speaks of a quality which, 
although particular and not general, sustains a common 
relation to several individual objects. He says, for 
example: "A man may consider a figure merely as tri- 
angular, without attending to the particular qualities of 
the angles, or relations of the sides" ; and again he ob- 
serves: "An idea which, considered in itself, is partic- 
ular, becomes general by being made to represent or 
stand for all other particular ideas of the same sort." 1 

This looks very much like giving up the question as 
to the possibility of abstract ideas. Once admit that 
the abstract idea does not involve a general inclusion in 
itself of the ideas of all the qualities which belong to a 
class of individuals, but is a particular idea — that is, 
an idea of a single quality which holds a common rela- 

1 Principles of Human Knowledge. 



120 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tion to several individuals, and that is all that we care 
to contend for. And Sir William Hamilton, who con- 
curs with Berkeley in his nominalism, attributes to him, 
and himself holds, the doctrine of the possibility of such 
abstract ideas. The question is, What grounds the re- 
lation of resemblance between the individuals compos- 
ing what is called a class ? The answer is, and must be, 
Some quality which is common to them. And this is 
the answer which Hamilton gives in expounding the 
nominalistic theory. 

When, in maintaining the first mentioned of these 
views, Berkeley says that a general notion, or, what is 
the same thing, an abstract idea, is merely a name, and 
that we delude ourselves when we suppose it anything 
else, he loses sight of the obvious consideration that a 
name is significant, or it is an unmeaning cipher. It is 
the symbol of something. If then there be not some 
quality which is signified by what is called a general 
term, the term is mere gibberish. We have seen that 
Berkeley stated the true doctrine when he granted the 
existence of ideas of particular qualities having com- 
mon relations. It is precisely such ideas or concepts as 
are symbolized by general terms. If, then, there may 
be, according to his own admission, abstract ideas of 
phenomenal qualities, his general doctrine is invalidated, 
that no such things as abstract ideas can exist. This 
argument, however, has no direct bearing upon the ques- 
tion in hand, namely, whether there can be the abstract 
idea of the substance of matter ; for the abstract idea of 
phenomenal qualities being conceded, it does not follow 
that such an idea of substance may exist. The indirect 



Berkeley's Idealism. 121 

office discharged by the argument — and it is a valuable 
one — is to break down the universal affirmation that no 
abstract ideas are possible. 

Secondly, there is another kind of abstract idea which 
it is more pertinent, and indeed which it is vital, to the 
discussion, to consider. It is the abstract idea of things 
which are not phenomenal, but which it is common to 
infer as the substrates of phenomenal qualities, as their 
ground of manifestation and their bond of unity. Such 
an idea is that of cause, which it is usual with men, not 
biased by some philosophical hypothesis, to infer from 
phenomenal changes. Such an idea is that of substance, 
which it is also common to infer from phenomenal qual- 
ities — the substance of the soul, the substance of God, 
and the substance of matter. Berkeley confines our 
knowledge of matter (so-called) to perception. As it 
will be confessed on all hands that we cannot perceive 
substance, it follows from his datum that we have no 
knowledge of material substance, or, to use his phrase- 
ology, we can have no abstract idea of it ; the terms mean 
nothing. The thing signified by them is a chimera. 

In the first place, the argumentum ad liominem may 
be employed against this view. Bishop Berkeley, as a 
Christian theologian, admitted the existence of the sub- 
stance of God. That he, or any one else, could know 
that transcendent substance by perception, internal or 
external, is out of the question. How, then, did he con- 
strue the apprehension of it \ The answer must be by 
one of these very abstract ideas of substance which he 
vehemently rejects. He contends that we know God, 
apart from the direct testimony of revelation, though 



122 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

those phenomenal manifestations of himself which he 
denominates ideas — the objectified, externalized ideas 
of the Divine Being. Of course, then, he inferred the 
existence of the divine substance from these finite mani- 
festations. As the substance is not, cannot be, per- 
ceived, it cannot be a concrete percept. What then ? It 
can only be apprehended as an abstract idea. But the 
bishop's position is that there can be no abstract idea of 
substance. This one, eminent instance to the contrary, 
negatives his assertion, and negatives it by virtue of his 
own confession. But, if we may have an abstract idea 
of the divine substance, why not of material substance ? 
The alleged impossibility of such an idea will not an- 
swer. The argument from the incompetency of per- 
ception to furnish it palpably breaks down. 

In the second place, Berkeley expressly admits the 
existence of the substance of the soul, but he contends 
that we know it by consciousness. E"ow consciousness 
is equivalent to immediate knowledge, and unless we 
utterly misconceive his doctrine, it is precisely that con- 
sciousness involves such knowledge. But we may safely 
challenge the proofs from any quarter that we have im- 
mediate knowledge, or, what is the same, an intuition of 
the substance of the soul. If we have, we can describe 
it, as we can every object of immediate knowledge. Who 
ever succeeded in doing this ? It is too obvious to re- 
quire argument that what knowledge of the soul's sub- 
stance we possess is not derived from a direct gazing 
upon it in consciousness; it is not an intuition, a per- 
cept. We immediately and necessarily infer its ex- 
istence from its phenomenal manifestations of which 



Beekeley's Idealism. 123 

we are conscious, and therefore have immediate know- 
ledge. The idea, then, which we have of the substance 
of the soul is an abstract idea. Here we have another 
instance of a knowledge of substance which is not di- 
rectly derived from perception, a knowledge without 
which we must apprehend our mental being as a mere 
bundle of phenomenal qualities ligated by no bond of 
unity — appearances of something which has no exis- 
tence, qualities of nothing to be qualified. If, there- 
fore, the substance of God and the substance of the soul 
cannot possibly be percepts, we have a knowledge of 
them through ideas which are abstracted from any con- 
crete appearance. Why not — the question recurs — why 
not a similar abstract idea of the substance of matter ? 
There is certainly nothing in the constitution of our 
minds to preclude such knowledge. It must be shown 
that there is something peculiar in the very nature of 
what is called matter, which exempts it from the possi- 
bility of being thus apprehended. 

In the third place, unless there be some philosophical 
speculation which gives their minds a peculiar bent, 
men are accustomed to infer the existence of substance 
from perceived phenomena. This is well-nigh a uni- 
versal law ; it finds utterance and proof alike in the lan- 
guage which is almost universal in its employment. The 
term phenomenon has scarcely any meaning, unless there 
is something which grounds appearance, unless all real- 
ity is reduced to mere appearance, and everything 
around us and within us which is an object of perception 
is "mere shine.' 7 The term manifestation implies that 
there is something which is manifested. Quality sug- 



124 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

gests something which is qualified ; property something 
to which the thing so denominated belongs. Mode infers 
something which is modified. Attribute guarantees 
something to which somewhat is due. Accident probably 
signifies etymologically that which falls upon something 
else for support. The term substance itself, which be- 
longs to the language of at least every cultivated people, 
would be a meaningless collection of letters, unless it 
signified something which is under other things and 
serves in some sort as their support. And we cannot 
here forbear remarking that although the bishop makes 
great sport of the thing called substance, and facetiously 
asks what kind of pillars it has, he very naturally, like 
ordinary mortals, talks of the substance of the soul as 
supporting its qualities. We might have craved of him 
the favor to tell us what its pillars look like, and how 
they hold up qualities ! 

The terms which have been mentioned, used as they 
are almost universally, sufficiently indicate the common 
belief of the race in the existence of substance; and as 
all of them are more or less commonly applied to the 
substance of matter, the common belief of the race in the 
existence of that kind of substance. Berkeley's en- 
deavor to show that his theory really interprets this be- 
lief is only an ingenious attempt to quadrate his specula- 
tions with the convictions of mankind. It is certainly a 
powerful presumption against any opinion that it tra- 
verses universal conviction. 

2. There pervades all Berkeley's reasoning in sup- 
port of his theory the confusion of the knowledge of ex- 
istence with existence itself. If this were an oversight, 



Bekkeley's Idealism. 125 

it would certainly be curious, and all the more curious 
that it is not noticed by his distinguished commentator, 
Professor Eraser. If it were designed as an inherent 
element in his system, it behooved him to rebut the pre- 
sumption which lies against it by an articulate consid- 
eration of it. Whatever may be thought of the doctrine 
of the relativity of knowledge, as expounded by Sir Wil- 
liam Hamilton, as a whole, the position that, while all 
that is known by us must in some way be in relation to 
our faculties, still our knowledge is not the measure of 
existence, is so obviously true as to commend itself to 
an almost unquestioning acceptance. In this affirmation 
the great Scottish philosopher limits knowledge to per- 
ceptive knowledge, which is substantially Berkeley's po- 
sition. But Hamilton admitted and contended for the 
doctrine that there are realities, transcending perception, 
which must be believed, — realities which are close to us, 
such as the occult substance of the soul and the equally 
occult substance of matter. But however close to us an 
alleged reality may be, Berkeley declares its non-exis- 
tence, except it be perceived. Now, the doctrine is so 
astounding that perceptive knowledge grounds or even 
conditions real existence, that only arguments of the 
most demonstrative character could induce its reception. 
It is to violate common sense to say that knowledge is 
efficiently causal of existence. We necessarily attribute 
it to power as its efficient cause. Power is productive, 
knowledge apprehensive. It may direct power, but can- 
not be conceived as substituting it. And this is all the 
more remarkable, inasmuch as Berkeley holds — and at- 
tention is particularly invoked to the fact — that the sen- 



126 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

sible phenomena which he calls ideas and maintains to 
be grounded for existence in perception are caused by 
the creative power of God. Granted that he admits 
realities which our perceptions cannot reach, and that 
they exist because God perceives them, how is that posi- 
tion to be reconciled with the other, that God causes 
their existence by his will ? But if God may cause the 
existence of realities which, in consequence of their dis- 
tance from us we cannot apprehend by perception, he 
may cause the existence of substance very near to us 
which may equally lie beyond the scope of the mere per- 
ceptive faculty. The truth is that neither our own 
knowledge, perceptive or not, nor that of other finite 
beings, nor that of God himself, is the ground, or effi- 
cient cause, of existence. It is true that nothing exists 
without God's knowledge, but it is another thing to- say 
that nothing can exist except it is produced by his know- 
ledge. If this be true of the Infinite Spirit, much more 
is it true of our spirits. And if it be true of all know- 
ledge, it certainly is of perception. The mere fact, 
therefore, that alleged material substance is out of rela- 
tion to our perceptions in no degree affects the question 
of its existence. There may be and probably are a thou- 
sand existences around us of which we can have no 
knowledge by perception. God himself is around us and 
in us, but we perceive him not. 

3. Berkeley's theory, in restricting the knowledge of 
material existence to perception, takes no account of the 
fundamental laws of belief, and the faith- judgments 
which spring from them when elicited into expression 
by the conditions of experience. It was one of the great 



Bekkeley's Idealism. 127 

offices discharged by Kant and the philosophers of the 
Scottish school that they called attention to the funda- 
mental forms of thought and belief which are imbedded 
in the very foundations of our nature. Perception fur- 
nishes the conditions upon which they emerge into con- 
sciousness and affirm themselves, but once drawn forth 
from their latency, they originate the grandest know- 
ledges of the human soul. It is not our perceptions, it is 
our faith- judgments, which impart the highest import 
to our knowledge, and stamp the loftiest significance 
upon our duties, our relations and our destiny. It is 
such judgments as cannot be furnished by perception, 
judgments which give us cause and substance, God and 
immortality, that lend the truest dignity to our being. 
To leave out of account these fundamental laws with 
their accompanying inferences is to sink out of view by 
far the most important elements of our knowledge. 
Now, it is exactly these principles which lead to the in- 
ference of substance, and it is no wonder that Berkeley, 
in overlooking them, has been led into the capital error 
of concluding that because perception cannot affirm the 
existence of material substance, therefore it cannot exist. 
This is the point at which his theory especially breaks 
down. 

So far as to Berkeley's denial of the existence of ma- 
terial substance. 

II. The second question which claims consideration 
is, whether phenomenal things, ordinarily termed ma- 
terial, are as ideas dependent upon the perceptions of 
spirit; for Berkeley's regulative principle is esse est 
percipi — to be is to be perceived. Let it be observed 



12$ Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

that the question is not now in regard to the substance of 
matter. That question is discharged. It is in respect 
to what are ordinarily termed the phenomena of matter. 
And in order that this question may be distinctly ap- 
prehended let us for a moment recall Berkeley's doc- 
trine. He maintains the view that there are no* ma- 
terial phenomena as such. The phenomena so called are 
dependent for existence upon the perception of spirits. 
They have no separate, independent existence. There 
is no such thing as a material system. Materiality is 
denied and immateriality affirmed. All sensible phe- 
nomena are ideas, and these ideas are dependent upon 
perception, and are all in the mind. Properly speaking, 
they have no external objective existence, except so far 
as ideas in the mind can be said to have existence. All 
the so-called qualities of matter are contained under this 
denomination — ideas. These ideas, further, are sensa- 
tions, for whatever is an object of perception is a sensa- 
tion. Sensations include all the qualities of so-called 
matter — the primary as well as the secondary. Ideas, 
sensible things, real ideas, real things, sensible objects, 
sensible phenomena, sense-given ideas or objects, sensa- 
tions — these all, however, Berkeley's phraseology and 
even his statements sometimes vary, are by him treated 
as the same. This may safely be affirmed to be his 
catholic doctrine. The question before us is, then, in 
regard to the position that all so-called material phe- 
nomena, as ideas, are dependent for existence upon their 
being perceived by spiritual substance. 

1. The theory is chargeable with the logical fault of 
wanting scientific coherence and self -consistency. 



Berkeley's Idealism. 129 

(1.) In stating the main principle which regulates 
it — namely, to be is to be perceived, it was absolutely 
necessary that the question be met upon the perception 
of what spirits do material phenomena, or ideas, depend 
for existence ? This question Berkeley answers by say- 
ing that some ideas depend upon the perception of 
human spirits, others upon that of non-human finite 
spirits, and all upon that of the Infinite Spirit. It would 
seem to be evident that he started out with the hypothesis 
that it is the perception of the individual human spirit 
which conditions phenomenal existence. And to this he 
adhered until the difficulties attaching to it shut him up 
to the admission that all phenomenal existence cannot 
depend upon the perception of an individual finite spirit. 
This is made apparent from the way in which he dealt 
with the difficulty raised by the absence of the individual 
from certain phenomenal realities, and the impossibility, 
consequently, of his perception conditioning their ex- 
istence. He states the case himself. While he was pres- 
ent in his study, the existence of the books it contained 
depended upon his perceiving them. But was their ex- 
istence suspended while he was absent and could not 
perceive them ? "No, he replies, when absent I can 
imagine them, and the imagination of them conditions 
their existence. 

Subsequently, he saw the absurdity of this position, 
and took the ground that their existence depended, in 
the absence of all human percipients, upon the percep- 
tion of the omnipresent Spirit. This ought, in con- 
sistency, to have led him to the abandonment of the sup- 
position that any phenomenal reality depends for ex- 



130 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

istence upon the perception of human spirits, or even 
upon non-human finite spirits, and to the assertion of 
the view that all phenomenal reality depends for ex- 
istence upon the perception of the Infinite Spirit, But 
this he did not do, and the consequence is that he 
jumbles the perceptions of finite spirits and of the In- 
finite Spirit as the ground of phenomenal existence. 
One or the other ought to have been affirmed, not both. 
They cannot possibly be made the conjoint or common 
ground of phenomenal existence. 

(2.) Another evidence of inconsistency in the theory 
lies in the fact that ideas and sensations are treated as 
the same ; for Berkeley says that sensations are internal 
feelings, and that ideas are external things. How can 
mental phenomena be at the same time internal and ex- 
ternal ? To escape this inconsistency it may be said that 
they are not at the same time both internal and external, 
but as the same things they are first one and then the 
other. Let us take that supposition. If they be first 
internal and then become external, the difficulty occurs 
that as sensations are necessarily subjective feelings, 
there would in, the first instance be nothing to originate 
them ; there would be no external reality to which they 
would correspond. Another difficulty would be, as ideas 
and sensations are the same, to account for their be- 
coming external. For Berkeley holds that external 
ideas are not caused by the will. But their externaliza- 
tion could only take place in consequence of some mental 
effort or energy. They must therefore externalize them- 
selves, which is absurd, since it is contended that they 
possess no causal force. These difficulties are fatal to 



Bekkeley's Idealism. 131 

the supposition that ideas or sensations are first internal 
and then become external. 

But, on the other hand, let it be supposed that they are 
first external and then become internal. The difficulty 
then would be to account for the transition. As exter- 
nal they must be conceived as grounding themselves as 
internal, which is absurd; and besides, the supposition 
is inconsistent with Berkeley's main principle, that per- 
ception grounds ideas or sensations. It cannot be true 
that ideas or sensations as external ground themselves 
as internal, and that perception grounds their existence 
whether as internal or external. In addition to this, 
it is obvious that as a sensation, from the nature of the 
case, is a mental feeling, and therefore subjective; it is 
incompetent to represent it as first external and objec- 
tive, and then internal and subjective. But whether this 
reasoning be correct or not, the principal feature of the 
inconsistency returns in force, namely, that ideas and 
sensations being treated as the same, it cannot be main- 
tained that ideas are external phenomena and sensations 
are internal feelings. If ideas are not external phe- 
nomena, absolute subjective idealism is the result, and 
that Berkeley does not affirm ; if sensations are not inter- 
nal feelings, but external phenomena, materialism is 
the result, and that it is the main purpose of his phil- 
osophy to deny. 

(3.) Still another element of inconsistency may be 
noticed. Berkeley contends that there can be no phe- 
nomenal realities, or, what is the same, there can be no 
ideas, except there be the perception of them by spirit. 
Now this must mean, if it mean anything, that the per- 



132 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ception of spirit grounds the existence of ideas. What 
else does the great maxim signify — esse est percipi, be- 
ing is to be perceived ? The being of ideas depends on 
their being perceived. Yet Berkeley explicitly says 
that ideas are not caused by finite spirits, but caused 
alone by the will of God. Here the ground of the ex- 
istence of ideas is declared to be God's will. There are 
then two grounds for their existence — the perception of 
finite spirits and the will of the Infinite Spirit, This 
is certainly a confusion of thought, If it be said that 
the ground of existence which is assigned to finite per- 
ception is different from the cause of existence, the dis- 
tinction is unintelligible. And, further, if the ground 
of existence in perception is shifted from finite spirits 
to the infinite Spirit, inconsistency still emerges, for it 
is inconsistent to say that the ground or cause of the ex- 
istence of ideas is at the same time in the perception 
and in the will of God. Whatever may be thought of 
the hypothesis that God's knowledge is the cause of 
finite existence, it is not unintelligible. And it is cer- 
tainly competent to say that God's will, on the other 
hand, is the cause of finite existence. But it is un- 
meaning to say that such a cause is to be referred in the 
same sense both to the knowledge and the will of God. 
Such are some of the inconsistencies which inhere in 
Berkeley's theory ; and if they have been proved to exist, 
they cannot but damage its truth. 

2. Having pointed out the logical inconsistency of 
Berkeley's theory in its attempt to find a ground of phe- 
nomenal existence, first in the perception of individual 
finite spirit, then in that of a number of finite spirits, 



Berkeley's Idealism. 133 

and lastly in that of the Infinite Spirit, or in the percep- 
tion of both finite spirits and of the Infinite Spirit, we 
proceed to show that the theory involves real incon- 
sistencies — inconsistencies not merely of arrangement, 
but of a metaphysical character. When, as was in- 
evitable, it became apparent that no individual finite 
spirit could possibly be at all times in the relation of per- 
ception to any section of phenomenal existence, how- 
ever limited, or at any time to the whole of phenomenal 
existence, the view had to be abandoned that phenomenal 
existence is grounded in the perception of individual in- 
telligence. This is conceded by the editor of Berkeley's 
works, and was substantially admitted by the bishop 
himself. Kecourse was then had to the view that the 
ground of phenomenal existence was to be sought in the 
aggregate perceptions of all finite intelligences. This 
supposed that there are no phenomenal realities which 
are not in relation to the perception of some finite spirits. 
But it soon became evident that this supposition could 
not be maintained. It is not only a fact which must 
be acknowledged that even that small part of phenomenal 
reality which at some time may be related to the percep- 
tion of the individual is not at all times so related, but 
that there can be no proof of the relation at all times of 
the whole or even of a part of phenomenal reality to any 
finite perception. On the contrary, it is easy to sup- 
pose the existence of phenomenal reality apart from re- 
lation to the perception of any finite intelligence. If, 
for instance, the moon be uninhabited, its particular 
features would exist out of relation to intelligent finite 
beings, and their existence could not be said to be 



134 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

grounded in the perception of such beings. So, upon the 
geologic assumption that the world existed long before 
it became the home of intelligent beings, its existence 
could not have been conditioned by their perception. 
Nor can we resist the conviction that if this globe were 
now stripped by some dread catastrophe of all its in- 
telligent occupants, it might continue to exist, although 
out of relation to all human perception. The hypothesis 
of the existence of spirits, of whom the Bible alone 
speaks, is hyperphysical, and therefore cannot enter as 
an element into a strictly philosophical argument. 

Now, how were these obstrusive and admitted diffi- 
culties met by Berkeley's theory ? In this way : the sen- 
sations which are at any given period of time experi- 
enced by finite intelligences, although they could not 
have been always experienced by them, nor can be in the 
whole future experienced by them, are, while experi- 
enced, signs of past and future sensations. It is easy to 
detect the insufficiency of this extraordinary hypothesis, 
framed to account for the existence of sensations or 
ideas when they stood or will stand in no immediate re- 
lation to finite perception. Let us not lose sight of the 
thing to be proved. It is that phenomenal existence 
abides when no finite being perceives it. The proof fur- 
nished is, that present sensations, which are perceived, 
are signs of the existence of past and future sensations. 
But it is,ex hypothesi, admitted that thesepastand future 
sensations are out of relation to perception, and are sig- 
nified by present sensations which alone are in relation 
to perception. Now Berkeley's great principle is that 
perception grounds or conditions phenomenal existence. 



Bekkeley's Idealism. 135 

According to this principle, then, these past and future 
sensations or phenomenal realities being conceded to be 
unrelated to perception can have no existence. It is 
not sensations or ideas, according to Berkeley, which 
ground the existence of other sensations or ideas — that 
he denies ; but it is always perception which is the reason 
of their existence. As then the only ground of past and 
future phenomenal existence which is assigned by this 
hypothesis is significant sensations or ideas, the hypoth- 
esis is signally out of harmony with the main theory. 

Further, it is obvious to remark that the supposition 
of these significant sensations in order to show that phe- 
nomenal realities may exist out of relation to finite per- 
ception is a clear abandonment of the principle that any 
phenomenal realities depend for existence upon the per- 
ception of finite intelligences. If some confessedly exist 
apart from that relation, all may. 

If, in reply to this reasoning, it be urged that these 
sensations which are signs of past and future phenome- 
nal existences, out of relation to the perception to finite 
spirits, are signs of phenomenal existence in relation to 
the perception of the infinite Spirit, and having its 
ground of continuance in that perception, it must be 
rejoined that this would be to change the issue. If in an 
attempt to show that present sensations, as signs, prove 
the continued existence of phenomenal realities in rela- 
tion to finite intelligence, it be at the same time main- 
tained that their persistence in being is due to God's per- 
ception, the question is altered, and the procedure is 
illegitimate. This but serves to fortify the stricture 
already passed upon the theory that it inconsistently 



136 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tries to found phenomenal existence alike upon the per- 
ception of finite and of infinite intelligence. The theory 
ought to have been purged of this inconsistency, and to 
have sought the ground of phenomenal existence simply 
and alone in the divine perception. It would in that 
case have had, at least, the advantage and the merit of 
unity. 

3. It is clear that in those cases in which phenomenal 
realities or ideas are in immediate relation to our per- 
ception Berkeley's doctrine is that they depend for ex- 
istence upon that perception. There is an evident diffi- 
culty which lies in the way of this hypothesis. Most, if 
not all, of the phenomena which come within the scope 
of our perception operating through the senses are not 
simple, but compound. Now, it is certain that some of 
the fundamental elements of these complex realities are 
beyond the reach ordinarily of sense-perception. It is 
only the art of the chemist and of the microscopist which 
can avail to reveal to us their sensible existence. Nor 
can it be proved that there are not still simpler and more 
ultimate elements in existence than those which even 
that art has brought to light. These elements lying out 
of the reach of perception are, according to Berkeley's 
theory, destitute of a ground of existence. As they are 
not perceived by us, they do not exist. And yet these 
very unperceived and consequently non-existent ele- 
ments are the ground-forms of those complex wholes 
which are obstrusively presented to perception. 

4. Upon Berkeley's theory representative knowledge 
is impossible. Let us remember certain of his prin- 
ciples: perception is immediate knowledge of ideas or 



Bekkeley's Idealism. 137 

phenomenal realities. All external phenomenal real- 
ities are known by perception. Their existence depends 
upon perception. It follows that unless they be per- 
ceived, unless they be immediately known, they can- 
not exist. !N"ow Berkeley distinguished ideas into two 
classes — real and imagined. Real ideas are sensible phe- 
nomena, which are not caused by us, but caused by God's 
will. Imagined ideas are mental phenomena of our own 
creation ; they are caused by our wills. From all this it 
is plain that Berkeley grounded the existence of all phe- 
nomenal realities in perception. The question then is, 
When we do not perceive these real phenomenal ex- 
istences, how do we know them ? The ordinary answer 
would be, by representing them in the imagination. 
Apprehending by immediate knowledge, that is, by in- 
ternal perception or consciousness, the representing 
images, we necessarily believe in the existence of the 
objects represented. We have a knowledge of the 
formerly presented objects which is mediate, it is true, 
but is, at the same time, valid and trustworthy. But 
Berkeley could not, consistently with his theory, thus 
answer. Nothing but perception, that is, immediate 
knowledge, of the object can ground its real existence. 
Where that is wanting, the ideas we cognize are mere 
creatures of the imagination, in themselves unreal, and 
having no ground of existence. They represent no 
realities; they are spectral and illusory. Representa- 
tion is not perception: perception alone gives us real, 
objective existence; consequently, the representative 
faculty cannot give us that sort of reality. 

Let these remarks be applied to memory as a repre- 



138 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

sentative faculty. The external, phenomenal facts once 
presented are no longer in relation to perception. They 
have, therefore according to Berkeley's theory, lost their 
ground of existence. To be is to be perceived. They 
are not perceived, consequently they are not. If we 
imagine them by the representative faculty, we can 
have no guarantee of their reality. All the past, as it 
has slided away from relation to our perception, is irre- 
coverably gone into the region of unreality. The larg- 
est section of our knowledge is obliterated. The repre- 
sentative faculty as one furnishing the knowledge of the 
real is nil. This consequence may appear too absurd 
to be imputed to Berkeley's theory. Let him who thinks 
so apply the controlling principle, to be is to be per- 
ceived, to the processes of our faculties of representative 
knowledge, and he must be convinced of the legitimacy 
of the consequence. 

5. It revolts common sense to say that a phenomenal 
reality would cease to exist were there no finite spirit 
to perceive it ; that a mountainous pile of rock, for ex- 
ample, would not exist, if some spirit were not perceiv- 
ing it. The case does not bear reasoning. It so tra- 
verses common conviction that its enouncement pro- 
vokes derision, and deservedly provokes it. So sen- 
sible was Bishop Berkeley of this, and also his inter- 
preter, Professor Eraser, that it was deemed necessary 
to invoke a hyperphysical ground for the persistence of 
objects not perceived by finite beings, and in that way 
to supplement the deficiencies of the theory. This re- 
treat from the hypothesis that phenomenal existence is 
grounded in finite perception was its deliberate sacri- 



Berkeley's Idealism. 139 

fice. When its friends forsook it, what could be ex- 
pected for it from the tender mercies of its foes ? When 
the Israelites retired from Saul, the Philistines decapi- 
tated him and fastened his body to the wall of Beth- 
shan. Why, then, it may be asked, attack an. abandoned 
hypothesis ? Is it not most conclusively refuted by the 
fact that its originators gave it up ? The answer is, that 
they gave it up, and they did not give it up. They con- 
fessed its insufficiency and continued to speak in defence 
of it, as one would mention some of the virtues of a for- 
saken friend. It is right to shut them up to its com- 
plete relinquishment and to the advocacy of another 
hypothesis — the grounding of phenomenal existence in 
God's perception. 

No reasoning, however subtle, supported though it be 
by the genius of the accomplished Bishop of Cloyne, 
can succeed in practically convincing men that their sen- 
sations are the same with the external, phenomenal 
things by which they are surrounded, and which they 
are accustomed to regard as only the occasions of the 
sensations. They cannot be argued into the belief that 
the pain they feel is the very same with the fire to which 
they attribute it — with the wood and the flame; that 
the sensation of hardness they experience is the same 
with the great iron pillar that helps to sustain a massive 
roof; that the sensation they feel when beholding the 
glories of the starry heavens is the same with the 
measureless systems that stud the amplitude of space. 
When, in the elegant dialogue in which Berkeley de- 
fends his theory, Hylas, the representative of the ex- 
istence of matter, confesses his entire conversion to the 



140 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

views of Philonous, the exponent of immaterialism, he 
utters the confession amidst throes and misgivings which 
suggest the nausea and vomiting of a man who, in the 
intervals of the spasms, endeavors to laud the virtues of 
the medicine which has sickened him. 

That a powerful presumption lies against a phil- 
osophical hypothesis which is contrary to the common 
convictions and belief of men is explicitly admitted by 
Berkeley himself, and he exerts his power of argument 
to show that his view upon this subject is not opposed 
by the weight of that presumption. He succeeded, as 
was to be expected, in persuading his imaginary inter- 
locutor, Hylas, of the tenableness of this view, but not 
much is risked by the statement that his argument would 
not meet with the same success if addressed to the mass 
of mankind. It is at least certain that the very need 
of such an argument supposes that the ordinary belief 
of men is opposed to the bishop's doctrine. 

7. That element of Berkeley's theory is incapable of 
justification, in which the doctrine of the school of asso- 
ciationalism is maintained, that the only relation be- 
tween sensible phenomena, ordinarily termed material, 
is one of mere antecedence and sequence. This view 
flows from his position that the will of God is the only 
cause which operates in the system of phenomenal rela- 
tions, that ideas are caused alone by his will, and have 
their connection with each other determined by a 
causality which is entirely foreign both to their own 
intrinsic nature and to the will of finite intelligences. 

(1.) This doctrine is paradoxical; it is out of har- 
mony with the common beliefs of the race. Whatever 



Beekeley's Idealism. 141 

philosophers may hold, it is idle to argue that men in 
general do not entertain the conviction that there is the 
relation of cause and effect between sensible phenomena, 
and between the will of man and the objects of the ex- 
ternal world. Even those philosophers who hold that 
the judgment which affirms the relation of cause and 
effect is not an original principle of our mental con- 
stitution, but is the result of experience, maintain the 
view that it is a necessary judgment unavoidably aris- 
ing from empirical conditions, while the drift of mod- 
ern philosophical thought is towards the assertion of the 
law of causality as one of the fundamental and original 
elements of our nature. And it cannot well be denied 
that this tendency falls in with the ordinary belief of 
mankind. Is a phenomenal change observed \ The 
natural inquiry which spontaneously arises is, What is 
its cause ? Let it be observed that this demand of reason 
is not made with reference merely to the origination of 
substantial existence or of phenomenal being, but also 
and most frequently in regard to changes which are 
recognized as taking place in the realm of simple phe- 
nomena. The hypothesis of antecedence and sequence 
does not satisfy this requirement ; and, to the extent of 
its involving that hypothesis as an integral element, 
Berkeley's theory clashes with the instinctive judgments 
of men. 

(2.) In regard to the position that the human will 
exerts no causal influence upon the relations of external 
phenomenal objects, we venture to take the ground that 
it contradicts consciousness, for consciousness delivers 
to us the fact that the will is competent to institute the 



142 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

relation of antecedence and sequence between external 
things. It can bring them together in that relation. 
And if so, the invariableness of the relation as a law 
which is not subject to voluntary control is disproved by 
a datum of consciousness. Nothing is more common 
than the collocation of sensible things by voluntary ac- 
tion for the purpose of securing desired results. And 
further than this, consciousness also delivers the fact 
that the continuance or interruption of the relation is 
within the power of the human will This could be il- 
lustrated in numberless ways. The hypothesis, then, 
that there is a fixed relation of mere antecedence and 
sequence between so-called material things, which can- 
not be affected by the free elections and the causal force 
of the human will, is evinced to be contradictory to the 
deliverances of consciousness, and they must be regarded 
as decisive, or there is no ground of certitude in ex- 
istence, no ultimate authority, an appeal to which ought 
to put an end to strife. Of course, there is no assertion 
here of the power of the human will to cause ideas, in 
Berkeley's sense of the word, as equivalent to phe- 
nomenal existences. What is affirmed is, that the rela- 
tions between these ideas are, to a large extent, deter- 
minable by the causal efficiency of the will. 

It might be objected to this view that there is no 
causal power in the will itself, and that the only relation 
between mental phenomena themselves, including voli- 
tions, is that of mere antecedence and sequence. But, 
however Berkeley may have prepared the way, by logi- 
cal consequence from his hypothesis as to material phe- 
nomena, for this sceptical result, as he did not himself 



Berkeley's Idealism. 143 

advocate, or even intimate it, it would be irrelevant here 
to discuss the question. Were the doctrine of Brown, 
Hume and the Mills under consideration, the case would 
be different. 

8. It is, however, legitimate to say that the theory of 
Berkeley logically led the way and conduced to the 
nescience of Hume, and to the agnosticism of the posi- 
tivist school of the present day. For, if the immediate 
inference from the testimony of consciousness to the 
real, substantial existence of matter as distinct from 
that of spirit be refused, the step is easy to the denial of 
the inference from its testimony to the real, substantial 
existence of spirit, as distinct from matter. The way is 
opened for the maintenance of any hypothesis which 
men may fancy, unembarrassed by the deliverances of 
consciousness. Hume took the path to the denial of 
the certainty of any substantial existence, and Spencer 
has taken that which led him to sink spirit in matter, 
and to affirm the unknowableness of God himself. Sir 
William Hamilton is right when he says that conscious- 
ness undoubtedly gives us in the same indivisible act the 
existence of spirit and that of matter, related in the 
synthesis of knowledge and contrasted in the antithesis 
of existence. Any other doctrine must logically tend to 
absolute idealism, or materialism, or nihilism; and we 
are disposed to think that there is no logical halting 
place between the acceptance of the deliverances of con- 
sciousness in their simplicity and integrity and the 
adoption of the desolating doctrines of atheists and 
nihilists. These remarks are reluctantly made in regard 
to the logical tendencies of Berkeley's theory. The 



144: Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

pious bishop would have repudiated with horror the con- 
sequences which a rigid logic in the unscrupulous hands 
of infidels has deduced from it ; but still, in the light of 
the developments which followed his death, it must, in 
candor, be allowed that his theory was the egg from 
which was hatched the philosophical scepticism of David 
Hume. 

9. There is another difficulty in Berkeley's theory 
which is so obvious that it cannot fail to be noticed. 
How, it may be demanded, does it ground our knowledge 
of other personal spirits than ourselves ? Berkeley holds 
that we know our own spirits, as thinking, willing, per- 
ceiving, essences — in a word, as personal substances, by 
self -consciousness. All that is objective to us must be 
known by the perception of ideas. These ideas he care- 
fully distinguishes from the properties of spirit. As our 
own ideas are not part and parcel of ourselves as spirits, 
so neither are ideas part and parcel of other spirits than 
ourselves. How, then, do we know other spirits? As 
we cannot be conscious of them as spirits, our knowledge 
is limited to the perception of ideas. But perception is, 
in this case, restricted to bodily organisms, and the lan- 
guage spoken or written through the instrumentality of 
these organisms. Now, according to Berkeley, they and 
the words produced by them are non-spiritual; they are 
merely ideas. Granted then that we apprehend these 
ideas by perception, the question is, how we know the 
spiritual substances to which they seem to be related, and 
to which, in the judgment of common sense, they are re- 
lated. Consciousness alone can give us spirit; percep- 
tion only gives us ideas. This difficulty cannot pos- 



Berkeley's Idealism. 145 

sibly be met by saying that we infer the existence of 
other spirits from these ideas, for Berkeley vehemently 
denies that we can infer occult realities from phenom- 
ena. The ideas are phenomena, consequently we are 
not allowed to derive the inference from them to spirit- 
ual essences. If, inconsistently with the principles of 
the theory, it be admitted that we must infer their ex- 
istence, that we must have a faith- judgment which af- 
firms it, the logical consequence would be that in the 
same way we might be entitled from phenomena, which 
Berkeley asserts to be non-spiritual, to infer the ex- 
istence of non-spiritual substance — that is, in the ordi- 
nary language of men, to infer from material phenom- 
ena the existence of material substance. As this would 
contradict the very principles of the idealistic theory, 
there can be no resort to inference to ground the know- 
ledge of any substance, spiritual or non-spiritual. It 
would seem, then, to be evident that upon Berkeley's 
theory we can have no knowledge of other personal 
spirits than ourselves. 

In reply to this reasoning it may be said that Berke- 
ley regarded ideas or sensible phenomena as a system 
of symbols — a language by means of which spirits hold 
intercourse with each other. He did; but how that 
opinion or hypothesis of his helps the matter, it is diffi- 
cult to see. For, even in our own case, he holds that 
ideas do not ground the existence of spirit, but the con- 
trary: the perception of spirit grounds the existence of 
ideas. We do not get the knowledge of our own spirits 
by ideas ; we get it by the immediate testimony of self- 
consciousness. How, then, can the perception of ideas 



146 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

give us the knowledge of other spirits ? We cannot be 
conscious of them; we cannot perceive them — we per- 
ceive only ideas, and they are non-spiritual. How, 
then, do we know them ? The theory furnishes no an- 
swer to this momentous question. It fails to account 
for, nay, it renders impossible, the knowledge by the 
individual personal spirit of other spirits like itself, 
and so destroys the possibility of communion between 
spirit and spirit: of all society based upon the fellow- 
ship and reciprocal action of personal intelligences — of 
the family, the church, the State. I know my own body 
only as a collection of ideas, from which it is illegitimate 
to infer the existence of my spirit. In the same way I 
know other human bodies; they are simply bundles of 
ideas from which I cannot infer the existence of other 
spirits. It would seem then that one personal spirit 
can know the existence of other personal spirits neither 
by consciousness, nor by external perception, nor by in- 
ference from phenomenal qualities or acts. 

No doubt it will be urged in answer to this grave alle- 
gation that there is another means of knowledge by 
which spirits may become acquainted with each other's 
existence that has been left out of account in this in- 
dictment. What should hinder their knowing each 
other by the testimony of each to its own existence? 
But the difficulty is not removed. How is this testimony 
delivered? The answer must be: through words, either 
spoken or written. These words, however, are, accord- 
ing to Berkeley's theory, a part of those sensible phe- 
nomena which he calls ideas. Certainly they are cog- 
nized through sense, and thus become objects of per- 



Beekeley's Idealism. 147 

ception. How, then, can we go beyond these percepts 
to reach the existence of other spirits than ourselves ? 
Shall we infer from them that existence ? This we are 
debarred from doing by Berkeley's principles. From 
perceived phenomena to argue the existence of unper- 
ceived substance — this is in no case warrantable; if it 
were, we might be unphilosophical enough even to be- 
lieve in the substance of matter as revealed by sensible 
phenomena ! As, therefore, the testimony which other 
spirits than myself furnish must itself be a collection of 
ideas, I am shut off from depending upon it as a means 
of knowing their existence. 

In order to turn the edge of this criticism, it may be 
charged with misconceiving Berkeley's doctrine, for he 
distinctly teaches that ideas are not caused by the per- 
sonal will of finite spirits, and as testimony delivered 
in language is caused by personal will, it cannot be con- 
sidered as belonging to the category of ideas. To this 
it is obvious to reply that the testimony must consist 
either of sounds or of written characters. As sounds are 
perceived through the sense of hearing, they are, accord- 
ing to Berkeley, sensations. They could be perceived 
in no other way, and in no other way could they be cog- 
nizable by us. They are consequently to be classed with 
Berkeley's ideas. Written or printed characters are 
perceived through the sense of sight. They also are sen- 
sations, and, therefore, to be ranked among his ideas. 
We must return then to the assertion that as they are 
ideas, they can, upon the bishop's principles, afford no 
ground for knowing spirit. If they be ideas, they are 
not caused by spirit, and we are excluded from referring 



148 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

them as effects to a spiritual cause. But if it must be 
admitted that they are caused by the personal will of 
spirit, there are some ideas which are caused by spirit, 
and Berkeley is made to contradict himself, since he 
affirms of all ideas that they have no such cause. The 
only escape from this contradiction would lie in holding 
that they are not ideas ; and that would be to deny their 
phenomenality, which has been already shown to be im- 
possible. To say that Berkeley proves the existence of 
God by the phenomenal world as his ideas is no answer, 
for he holds that God's ideas are caused by his will. 
Consequently, it would be legitimate to infer from them 
as effects his personal existence. There is no analogy 
between the cases. It has thus been evinced that upon 
Berkeley's theory one spirit cannot know the existence 
of other spirits. 

10. We come now, in the last place, briefly to con- 
sider that aspect of Berkeley's theory to which, in the 
final analysis, it was brought by himself — namely, that 
all phenomenal realities, commonly called material, are 
God's ideas. Let it be noticed that we do not depart 
from his own definition of ideas, as distinguished from 
thought, volition and perception, which he is careful to 
designate as the properties of spirit alone, God's ideas, 
then, will be treated in accordance with his own notion 
of them, as distinct from God's thoughts and from his 
perception. His doctrine is that the so-called material 
universe is a collection of God's ideas, created by his 
will, and dependent for existence upon his perception. 
At the same time it must not be forgotten that Berkeley 
to the last also contended that there are phenomenal 



Bebkeley's Idealism. 149 

realities which are human ideas, not indeed caused by 
the human will, but dependent upon human perception 
for their existence. In regard to this final devel- 
opment of his theory we make the following observa- 
tions : 

(1.) God's ideas are represented as being identical 
with fleeting, sensible phenomena, which, if any mean- 
ing can be attached to the language, is shocking to com- 
mon sense, 

(2.) God's ideas are in part corruptible, for it is 
manifest that some phenomenal realities, as, for in- 
stance, the human body, are corruptible. They dissolve, 
decay and rot, and what sense can be attached to the 
affirmation that divine ideas are thus corruptible it 
tasks the power of man to conceive, 

(3.) As all phenomenal existences are God's ideas, 
and some are man's ideas, some are both divine and 
human ideas at one and the same time. This involves 
a contradiction and an absurdity. 

(4.) As all ideas are said to be sensations, God is 
said to have sensations. 

(5.) As all ideas are God's ideas, and some ideas are 
our sensations, some of God's ideas are our sensations. 

(6.) As all ideas depend upon perception for ex- 
istence, for esse est percipi, God's ideas depend upon his 
perception for existence ; yet Berkeley contends that 
God's ideas are caused by his will, which is the same aa 
to say that they depend for existence upon his will. 
Now, either his perception and his will are held to be 
the same, and that is absurd, or they are held to be dif- 
ferent, and then the contradiction emerges that his ideas 



150 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

depend for existence upon his perception, and at the 
same time depend for existence upon his will. 

(7.) Either God's ideas are held to he a part of him- 
self or not. If they are not, the contradiction ensues 
that they are affirmed to he his ideas, and not his ideas 
at one and the same time. If they are a part of him- 
self, as the universe is said to he a collection of God's 
ideas, it is a part of himself, and idealistic pantheism is 
the inevitable result. 

(8.) God's ideas and his will are made one and the 
same. We cannot resist the conviction forced upon us 
by the analogies of our own being that force is an ex- 
pression of will. But there are forces in operation in 
the so-called material system, and that fact Berkeley ad- 
mits. Now that system being, according to him, nothing 
but God's ideas, it follows that its forces as phenomenal 
are parts of his ideas, and consequently that his ideas 
and his will are the same. But if they be said to be the 
same, a contradiction occurs. For God's ideas are said 
to be caused by his will, and a thing cannot without a 
contradiction be said to be caused by itself. 

(9.) Berkeley admitted the fact of creation. But 
the universe, he contends, is God's ideas. Consequently, 
God created his own ideas. But Berkeley, in his Siris, 
confesses his leanings to the Platonic doctrine of eternal 
ideas, and so Professor Eraser interprets him. We have 
then an eternal creation, which is a contradiction in 
terms, for that which is created had a beginning, and 
that which is eternal had no beginning. But if it be 
held notwithstanding, as Origen maintained, that an 
eternal creation is possible, and further, that the uni- 



Berkeley's Idealism. 151 

verse was eternally created, we have a Christian version 
of the old Greek doctrine of the eternity of matter, or, 
in Berkeley's phrase, of the phenomenal sensible system. 
One fails to see how this congeries of absurdities and 
contradictions can be denied as logically involved in 
Berkeley's theory, if it comprise as integral elements 
the two positions, that sensible phenomena or ideas are 
dependent for existence upon the perception of finite 
spirit, and that they are at the same time dependent for 
existence upon the perception of the Infinite Spirit. If 
the first of these elements be eliminated from the theory, 
in order to save it from self-contradiction and reduce it 
to unity, it is confessed that the bulk of Berkeley's 
writings, in which it is defended, are nothing worth; 
they have lost their significance and their interest. If 
it be retained, it must be granted that his most ardent 
admirers would find it an office which would task their 
utmost ability to adjust it to his latest thinking. What 
his latest thinking was, we collect from his Siris, which 
was the production of his age. In that remarkable spec- 
ulation we find him speaking in terms of approbation 
of Plato's eternal ideas, the only true realities in con- 
formity with which the universe of unreal and fleeting 
phenomena was brought into being. It cannot be denied 
that this subjects him to the criticism of changing the 
meaning of his terms. The term ideas, which plays 
the most important part in his previous reasoning as 
representing created phenomena of sense, is now made 
to signify the uncreated thoughts — the eternal ideals 
and archetypes of the Infinite Mind. Formerly ideas 
were treated by him as phenomenal objects, sensible 



152 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

things, dependent for existence upon finite perception ; 
now they are magnified as the concepts of the eternal 
intelligence. 

There are two hypotheses, each maintained by a writer 
of genius, upon one of which it is conceivable that an at- 
tempt might be made to relieve this inconsistency. One 
is that of the elder President Edwards, who was a corn- 
temporary of Berkeley, was preaching at Northampton 
when the dean was sojourning in Rhode Island, and held 
an idealistic theory which, to a remarkable extent, coin- 
cided with that of the latter. The other is that sup- 
ported in his work on metaphysics by Professor Borden 
P. Bowne, of Boston University. 

A few remarks will be made touching the hypothesis 
of Edwards, but that of Professor Bowne must be re- 
served for separate consideration. In regard to the 
question, how sensible things, which, with Berkeley, he 
held to be ideas, could continue to exist without finite 
minds to perceive them, Edwards took the ground that 
they exist in God's uncreated idea. Now, if all that the 
New England philosopher meant was that all phenome- 
nal things are transcripts of the ideas which eternally 
existed in the divine mind, what theist would care to 
deny the doctrine? But this was evidently not his 
meaning. The difficulty which he is meeting is this: 
A sensible thing or idea is supposed to be in actual ex- 
istence, but unperceived by any finite mind. How is 
its existence to be accounted for ? He distinguishes. 
Some things exist as created ideas, some in God's un- 
created idea. The thing supposed exists in God's un- 
created idea. There he finds its ground. But — 



Berkeley's Idealism. 153 

First, if, upon the supposition, the thing is in actual 
existence, although unperceived by any finite mind, it 
must be a created idea, for why attempt to account for 
the existence of an idea unperceived by finite mind, un- 
less, being created, it might be perceived by such a mind ? 
It is, therefore, contradictorialy represented as at the 
same time a created idea, and as being only in God's 
uncreated idea. 

Secondly, if it be only in God's uncreated idea, and 
yet, as Edwards holds, in actual existence in that idea, 
why suppose its creation ? The law of parcimony would 
exclude the creation of an idea which is already actually 
existent in uncreated idea? The fact is that we have 
a finite thing represented as actually existent, and not 
created at the same time, which amounts to this, that it 
is actually existent, and not actually existent, created, 
and not created, at the same time. How the master of 
argumentation by contradictories could have slipped 
into this contradiction it is hard to understand, except 
upon the principle that he who refuses to accept the 
data of consciousness has no safeguard against any 
error. The question whether a thing may not actually 
exist in God's uncreated idea, but which neither actually 
exists, nor may actually exist, in relation to our intelli- 
gence, is for us a non-existent question. We may as 
well inquire into the ground of existence of inhabitants 
of Alcyone, or even of our sun. But, whatever may be 
thought of Edward's speculation, his uncreated idea 
cannot lift Berkeley out of his inconsistency. For, if he 
taught anything, it was this : that all sensible things or 
ideas are created by the divine will; and how God's 



154 Discussion's of Philosophical Questions. 

uncreated ideas could be created by bis will, it would 
take more than Berkeley's or Edwards' abilities to 
show. 

This discussion of the idealism of Bishop Berkeley, 
however inadequate it may be, cannot well be deemed un- 
timely. The main current of thought at the present 
time, in consequence of the prodigious advance of the 
physical sciences, and the absorption of many acute 
investigators in the contemplation of outward phenom- 
ena, may be setting in the direction of materialism. But 
as one extreme of speculation tends to produce another, 
it is probable, it may almost with safety be predicted, 
that there will come a powerful re-action towards ideal- 
ism. The distinguished editor of Berkeley's Works not 
obscurely intimates his leaning to the theory they main- 
tain 1 , and the brilliant reviewer of Herbert Spencer's 
philosophy 2 declares himself an "objective idealist." 
As in the past the philosophical intellect has vibrated 
between the opposite extremes of materialism and ideal- 
ism, it is to be expected that there will be a similar oscil- 
lation in the future. 

Meanwhile the sober student of the facts of conscious- 
ness, and the Christian theist who accepts the obvious 
teachings of the Bible, will be content, as heretofore, to 
tread a middle path. They will continue to affirm the 
difference between the indissoluble and deathless spirit 
with its grand endowment of intellectual beliefs and 
moral intuitions, on the one hand, and divisible, cor- 

1 In this opinion we are sustained by Dr. Noah Porter : App. to 
Ueberweg's Hist. Phil., Vol. II., p. 438. 
Professor Bowne. 



Berkeley's Idealism. 155 

raptible matter, on the other; and holding to the doc- 
trine of creation as the only safe moorage, they will re- 
fuse to sublimate the world to unity with God, or sink 
God to identity with the world. Of any other theory, 
whatever may be its prestige, the similitude may be 
used, which was beautifully employed by Cardinal Pole, 
in a letter to the elegant scholar, Sadolet, with reference 
to the Platonic philosophy since the introduction of the 
divine system of Christianity : 

" Est in conspeetu Tenedos, notissima fama 
Insula, dives opum, Priami dum regna manebant; 
Nunc tantum sinus, et statio malefida carinis." 



OBJECTIVE IDEALISM. 



PEOEESSOB BOEDER P. BOWNE, of Boston 
University, in his able work on metaphysics, 
claims to be an "objective idealist." What objective 
idealism is, in his conception of it, may be compendi- 
ously described in his own words : 

" In discussing matter and force, we saw the difficulty which 
attends the atomic theory of matter viewed as an ontological fact, 
and we decided for the view that the elements are not properly 
things, but only constant forms of the action of the Infinite accord- 
ing to fixed laws. In addition, the discussion of interaction has 
shown that the impersonal finite can lay no claim to existence. 
For, as impersonal, it is without subjectivity; and, as finite, its 
objective action is mediated by the infinite; that is, it is done by 
the infinite. It has, then, no longer any reason for existence; and 
there is no longer any ground for affirming its existence. It does 
nothing, and is nothing but a form of thought based upon the 
activity of something not itself. This view we reproduce as our 
final verdict. Matter and material things have no ontological, 
but only a phenomenal, existence. Their necessary dependence 
and lack of all subjectivity make it impossible to view them as 
capable of other than phenomenal existence. This world-view, 
then, contains the following factors : ( 1 ) The Infinite energizes 
under the forms of space and time; (2) the system of energizing 
according to certain laws and principles, which system appears in 
thought as the external universe; and (3) finite spirits, who are 
in relation to this system, and in whose intuition the system takes 
on the forms of perception." 1 

Elsewhere he represents the universe as God's 
thoughts objectified. As it was incumbent on him to 

1 Metaphysics, pp. 465, 466. 
156 



Objective Idealism. 157 

show how this objectification takes place, he maintains 
that God's thoughts and his acts are the same ; that is, 
if the language means anything, in thinking the universe 
God produced it ; and being thus acted or produced, it 
continues as God's thoughts continuously acted out. 
The doctrine of continuous creation is more than ob- 
scurely hinted in this theory; it is expressly referred 
to as illustrating the theory. "We may," he says, "get 
some hint of what this may mean from the scholastic 
doctrine of preservation or continuous creation. Such 
creation could be nothing more than a movement of the 
divine activity according to the idea of the thing." 1 
This theory professes to differ from Berkeley's in the 
following particulars : 

In the first place, it does not ground phenomenal 2 
existence in the perception of finite spirit. It denies 
real existence to the phenomenal universe, and makes 
it simply the objectified and concrete forms of the divine 
thoughts. These are apprehended by us under "the 
forms of perception ;" that is, to us they would have no 
existence were they not perceived. They would still be 
God's thoughts, but we could not know them. In this 
respect, it must be granted that the theory is not identi- 
cal with Berkeley's — at least, in its earlier shape. 

In the second place, Berkeley's ideas, or phenomenal 
existences, were, in his first thinking, inert and passive ; 
they were created by the divine will, and have their 

1 Metaphysics, p. 466. 

2 The word phenomenal is used here in the sense of these 
writers. I believe that there are phenomena of spirit as well as 
of matter. 



158 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

condition of being in the intelligent apprehension of 
spirit. According to Professor Bowne, the phenomenal 
universe is a collection of God's thoughts, and its ele- 
ments are, therefore, active. The phenomenal elements 
have in themselves no real existence, not even derived 
and dependent, but are simply the concrete and observ- 
able expressions of God's intelligent activity. In this 
regard, also, the two theories differ, and I cannot help 
thinking that the Bishop's has the advantage, to the 
extent of avoiding a tendency to idealistic pantheism, so 
far as the non-spiritual universe is concerned — a ten- 
dency which seems to be lodged in the theory of the 
American metaphysician. 

In the third place, Berkeley, in his earlier specula- 
tions, distinguished between ideas or phenomenal reali- 
ties and thoughts as properly belonging to spirit alone ; 
and, on the supposition of the universal validity of this 
distinction, must be construed as having discriminated 
the phenomenal universe as a collection of God's created 
ideas from his eternal thoughts. On the other hand, 
Professor Bowne represents the phenomenal elements of 
the universe as. being the divine thoughts themselves. 
This constitutes another point of difference between his 
theory and Berkeley's — at least, in its earlier and most 
elaborated form. 

But, on the supposition that Berkeley's theory, in its 
latest stage of development, involved the doctrine that 
the so-called material universe is but a manifestation of 
God's thoughts, an expression simply of his intelligent 
activity, the two theories must be regarded as so far 
coinciding; and what has been advanced by the later 



Objective Idealism. 159 

philosopher comes in relevantly for consideration as 
applied to the views of the earlier. There is, it must be 
confessed, room for serious doubt as to the legitimacy 
of this supposition ; and it is bnt just to Berkeley that 
the grounds of this doubt should be indicated. It is, in 
the first place, not likely that he ever abandoned a doc- 
trine so vital to theism as that of the creation of the 
universe, non-spiritual as well as spiritual, by the power 
of God. If, however, he be regarded as having, in his 
last speculations, which led him to speak admiringly of 
the Platonic ideas, adopted a theory identical with that 
of Professor Bowne, he relinquished the fact of creation 
as related to the so-called material universe; for the 
Professor holds that only spirit is created, while the 
impersonal finite was not created, but evolved from the 
intelligent activity of God. He remarks: "We must 
say, then, that only self-hood suffices to mark oif the 
finite from the infinite ; and that only the finite spirit 
attains to substantial otherness to the infinite. Apart 
from this, there is nothing but the infinite and its mani- 
fold activities. The impersonal finite attains only to 
such otherness as an act or thought has to its subject. 
Finally, the spirit must be viewed as created." * It is 
extremely doubtful whether Berkeley ever came to hold 
this view. In the second place, it is supposable that 
Berkeley meant by his encomiums upon Plato's ideas 
simply that they were eternal concepts in the divine 
mind, in conformity with which the universe of phe- 
nomenal ideas has been fashioned, archetypes, of which 
so-called material realities are the ectypes. There would 

1 Met., p. 137. 



160 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

be confusion of language in the affirmation that ideas 
are the copies of ideas. Still, it is conceivable that he 
may have intended to say, that ideas as phenomenal and 
temporal are transcripts of ideas as transcendental and 
eternal. Such a construction of his views would not 
implicate them in Professor Bowne's theory, that the 
phenomenal universe is God's thought. 

But while it is due to Berkeley to give him the benefit 
of this doubt, it must still be allowed that in his Siris, 
which embodied his latest reflections, he affords some 
color to the supposition that he leaned to the adoption 
of views very like those expressed in the theory of Pro- 
fessor Bowne. Some brief strictures upon that theory 
will now be adventured. 

1. Either it is maintained, in this theory, that God is 
the Creator of the phenomenal universe, or it is not. If 
it is, then, as that universe is said to be a collection of 
God's thoughts, or his thought, objectified and made 
perceivable by finite spirit, God is represented as the 
Creator of his thoughts. This is self-contradictory and 
absurd ; for, in the first place, no analogy derived from 
the constitution of the human mind would lead to the 
view that thought is creatively caused by will. In the 
second place, if God's thoughts, any of them, were cre- 
ated, they had a beginning, and the inifinity and perfec- 
tion of the divine intelligence are denied, which is 
equivalent to the denial of a God. If it is not main- 
tained that God is the creator of the phenomenal uni- 
verse, as that universe is said to be an assemblage of his 
thoughts, or if the expression be preferred — his 
thought, it is contended that it is evolved from his 



Objective Idealism. 161 

intelligence as a part of himself ; and idealistic panthe- 
ism is affirmed, so far forth as the so-called material 
system is concerned; and how such a theory consists 
with the fundamental principles of theism it passes one's 
ability to comprehend ; for, surely, whatever, upon those 
principles, the relation of God to the material universe 
may be conceived to be, it is one which does not involve 
the identity of God with any part of the created system : 
in no sense is the universe he, or he the universe. This 
it is of the last consequence to theism to maintain. 

If, in resistance to the first member of this dilemma, 
it be said that God may be the creator of his acts ; what- 
ever may or may not be held as to the truth of this posi- 
tion, the answer is incompetent to the supporters of the 
theory under consideration, for it asserts the identity of 
God's acts and his thoughts. Consequently, the contra- 
dictoriness and absurdity charged upon the position, that 
God is the creator of his thoughts, are equally imputable 
to the position that he is the creator of his acts. They 
are, as related to the non-spiritual universe, held to be 
one and the same, and are, therefore, susceptible of com- 
mon predication. 

2. It is affirmed, in this theory, either that the phe- 
nomenal universe is infinite, or that it is finite. If 
infinite, either it is God or not. If it be God, pantheism 
is the result. If it be not God, there are two separate 
infinities, and they would be mutually exclusive ; and 
as God must exist and the universe be excluded, nihilism 
is the result. If the phenomenal universe be affirmed 
to be finite, as it is held to be God's thoughts, some of 
God's thoughts are finite; and how that can be main- 



162 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tained by a theist it is impossible to see. It is intelligible 
that God. may manifest himself finitely, but that is quite 
a different thing from saying that his thoughts are finite. 
Finite thoughts of an infinite being — that is a contra- 
diction. ]STor can it be believed that any aggregation of 
finite thoughts, however multiplied, could ever amount 
to the infinite. But if it could, the universe as that 
aggregate would be infinite, and the difficulties opposing 
the supposition of two infinities would again be encoun- 
tered. 

3. This theory necessitates the absurd inference that 
God's thoughts are contingent, fluctuating, corruptible; 
for, if anything is universally admitted, it is that these 
predicates may be affirmed of the world as phenomenal. 
It is no answer to say that there are laws and forces 
which are fixed, uniform, permanent. Besides these 
elements of nature, the unchanging character of which 
is not, strictly speaking, phenomenal, but inferred, there 
are others which are certainly subject to a perpetual 
flux ; and since all the parts of the phenomenal universe 
are said to be God's thoughts, these contingent, mutable, 
evanescent parts are his thoughts, and the absurdity is 
not removed. 

4. The question must be encountered by the main- 
tainors of this theory, What meaning can be attached to 
the affirmation that the phenomenal universe consists of 
the objectified thoughts of God ? The divine thoughts 
are supposed to be first immanent and subjective, and 
then to become transitive and objective. It is incum- 
bent on the supporters of this theory to show how this 
is possible. What is the nature, what the effect of such 



Objective Idealism. 163 

an objectification of the divine thoughts as constitutes 
the world of phenomena, and renders it perceivable by 
finite intelligence ? According to the common theistic 
doctrine, God, in conformity with his thoughts, or, what 
is the same thing, his intelligent plan, by an exercise of 
creative power, originates realities, which are different 
from himself, and, therefore, different from the thoughts 
of which they are the transcripts and reflections. Al- 
though the fact of creation, in its strict acceptation, is 
transcendental, in the sense that it cannot be conceived 
by the thinking faculty, it is not contradictory to the 
laws in accordance with which the processes of the reason 
are conducted. On the contrary, the thinking faculty 
furnishes, in connection with cosmical phenomena first 
perceived by the presentative faculty, then represented 
in the imagination, and finally mounting into concepts 
under thought-relations, the empirical conditions upon 
which a faith- judgment is reached that positively affirms 
the fact of creation. This is conceded by the abettors 
of the theory before us, with reference to the origination, 
by causal efficiency, of personal spirits. They deny it, 
however, in relation to sensible and impersonal phe- 
nomena. Such phenomena are not created; they are 
the objectified thoughts of God. 

The supposition of creation being, upon this theory, 
excluded as furnishing an account of the existence of 
the so-called material universe, there are, the being of 
God assumed, but three suppositions that need to be 
taken into account: first, that of the dualists, who con- 
tend for the co-eternity of God and matter as two inde- 
pendent substances; secondly, that of the eleatics, who 



164 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

deny the existence of the world, and admit only the 
reality of the Infinite; thirdly, that of the pantheists, 
who reduce the infinite and the finite to unity upon the 
same substance. That of spontaneous generation is 
thrown out of account. 

The co-eternity of God and matter is professedly 
denied by the theory under consideration, for it denies 
the existence of matter, as ordinarily apprehended ; but, 
at the same time, it admits sensible, impersonal phe- 
nomena, which are cognized under the forms of percep- 
tion. Now these phenomena are held to be the thoughts 
of God ; and as they are not created they must be eternal. 
The theory, therefore, agrees with the dualistic, so far as 
it asserts the eternity of the phenomenal universe. Its 
advocates may possibly disclaim the holding of this 
hypothesis, but logic inevitably deduces it from the 
theory itself. Either, the phenomenal universe was 
created or not. If created, it begun. If not, it did not 
begin ; that is, it is eternal. The theory denies that it 
was created. Consequently it affirms its eternity. There 
is no pause here to consider the question whether crea- 
tion may not be eternal. Although backed by the name 
of Origen, an eternal creation is self-contradictory and 
absurd. This theory is to be acquitted of maintaining 
the independence of the phenomenal universe, but not 
of holding its eternity. 

In answer, it may be said — and it is the only reply 
which, to my mind, is conceivable — that it is the mani- 
festation of the divine thoughts which constitutes the 
phenomenal universe. One can easily perceive the dif- 
ference between manifested and unmanifested thoughts, 



Objective Idealism. 165 

a difference only of relation to percipients, but how the 
thoughts themselves are intrinsically different it is hard 
to see. The thoughts which are manifested are the very 
same as those which existed before manifestation. If 
manifestation made new thoughts, it would be creation, 
and that the theory denies. What then ? Why this : the 
thoughts of God are eternal; the phenomenal universe 
is the thoughts of God; therefore, it is eternal. This 
element of the dualistic doctrine cannot be grafted upon 
a theory professedly theistic. 

The second hypothesis — that of the eleatics — denies 
the existence of the finite. Now that is what is done by 
the theory of Professor Bowne, so far as the so-called 
material system is concerned. The theory denies to it 
real existence, and affirms that the only real existence 
which appears is that of God's ever-active thoughts. 
We have, then, a slice of the eleatic hypothesis in this 
theory: not that it denies the existence of finite spirit, 
but so far as it denies that of finite matter. 

The pantheistic hypothesis makes the so-called finite 
material system the evolution and manifestation of the 
infinite substance. Now, as this theory posits a phe- 
nomenal system, but makes it the evolution and mani- 
festation of God's eternal thoughts, it is impossible to 
perceive how it differs, in this respect, from the hypothe- 
sis of idealistic pantheism. The personality of God is 
affirmed by it; otherwise, how could it assume to be a 
theistic theory? but creation of the material world is 
denied, and that is pantheistic. The evolution of the 
finite phenomenal system from the infinite being is 
affirmed : that, pro tanto, is pantheistic. We have, then, 



166 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

an element of the pantheistic hypothesis in this 
theory. 

The result of the analysis which has been instituted 
is the proof that the theory under consideration is partly 
theistie, partly dualistic, partly eleatic, and partly pan- 
theistic. It would be a splendid instance of a compre- 
hensive eclecticism, were it not for the unhappy fact that 
it attempts to integrate into unity jarring and irrecon- 
cilable elements. Unity, the great quest of philosophical 
inquiry, is the crown of a theory, but it cannot be won 
by an assemblage of contradictions. The acuteness of 
this speculation will elicit admiration, but its self- 
inconsistency will provoke a smile. 

" Humano capiti cervicem pictor equinam 
Iungere si velit, et varias inducere plumas 
Undique collatis membris, ut turpiter atrum 
Desinat in piscem mulier formosa superne, 
Spectatum admissi risum teneatis, amici?" 

To the sacrifice of the doctrines of natural realism, 
and the creation of the material system, the theistie 
philosopher and the Christian theologian cannot quietly 
consent. The battle for them is for "altars and fire- 
sides." They are essential alike to a true philosophy 
and a true theology. 



PANTHEISM, 



THE cardinal principle of pantheism is, that there 
is but one substance. It is in the highest sense a 
monistic system. Not only does it deny the dualism of 
finite spirit and matter, but it also denies the difference 
between finite spirit and matter as a common substance, 
on the one hand, and the infinite substance on the other. 
All that is finite is reduced to unity upon the primordial, 
infinite substance, which is called God. God is every- 
thing, and everything is God. 

There are three principal forms in which pantheism 
has been advocated : 

I. Spinozist pantheism, which affirms that God, as the 
one substance, is both thought and extension, that this 
substance manifests itself in what is called finite spirit, 
and also in what is called matter. 

II. Idealistic pantheism, which affirms that the one 
substance is simply spirit: matter is nothing. 

III. Materialistic pantheism, which affirms that the 
one substance is simply matter : spirit is nothing. 

It will be seen that all these forms of the theory are 
collected into ultimate unity by the assertion of the 
existence of but one substance, primordial and infinite. 

The leading features of the theory are : 

1. There is but one substance in existence. 

2. That substance is impersonal : God is not a person. 

167 



168 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

3. That substance is not creative: strictly speaking, 
God creates nothing. 

The order of this statement of elements will be fol- 
lowed in the presentation of arguments against the pan- 
theistic theory. 

I. Let us consider the position that there is but one 
substance in existence. 

1. The explicit testimony of consciousness is opposed 
to it. That testimony is, that the ego and the non-ego 
are different, though related, realities. In interpreting 
the testimony of consciousness, we are warranted in 
deriving from it those necessary inferences which are 
implicitly contained in it, and the evolution of which is 
enforced by the fundamental laws of belief, the original 
principles of cognition, which lie at the root of our 
mental nature. As we are obliged to infer, from the 
internal phenomena of our minds which are presented 
to consciousness, the existence of a subject which they 
manifest, and which is the bond of unity between them, 
so we are constrained to infer from the external phe- 
nomena presented to consciousness the existence of a 
substance similarly related to them. 

If these inferences are denied, our nature is an organ 
of deceit. The deliverances of consciousness, and the 
necessary inferences which flow from them, are, apart 
from a supernatural revelation, our only ultimate 
grounds of certitude. Kefuse credence to them, and the 
hypotheses which are advanced in regard to any reality, 
to any alleged existence, to the primordial substance 
itself, are mere vagaries. Pantheism, like every other 
theory, vanishes into the mists of nescience. 



Pantheism. 169 

It is plain that if, upon grounds of consciousness, we 
cannot affirm the substance of mind or matter, we can- 
not assert the substance of God. All is a dream — "the 
dream of a dream." Upon what possible ground will 
the pantheist found his proofs, if the data of conscious- 
ness are pronounced untrustworthy ? It is evident that 
ontology must begin with consciousness. If not, it has 
no assignable beginning, and is in the category of an 
absolute commencement. 

2. It is impossible to reduce the incompatible quali- 
ties of spirit and matter to unity upon the same sub- 
stance. If this cannot be done in regard to finite sub- 
stance, infinitely less can it be accomplished in relation 
to the infinite substance. The problem before the great 
absolutist speculators of Germany was to reduce all 
things to ultimate unity. The apparent chasm between 
spirit and matter had to be bridged. Eichte was con- 
sistent in his earlier thinking, when he affirmed pure, 
subjective idealism. Matter, as such, had no real ex- 
istence: "all that is, is the Ego." There was, indeed, 
the thesis and the antithesis of the Ego and the non-Ego, 
but this opposition was by an ultimate synthesis brought 
into unity in an exclusive subjective idealism ; but the 
problem was encountered in a different manner by 
Schelling and Hegel. Acknowledging the material 
reality of physical nature, they had the thesis and anti- 
thesis of matter and the absolute spiritual substance to 
overcome. The synthesis by which that result was 
achieved is, if the whole thing is not misconceived, one 
of the extraordinary curiosities of philosophical specu- 
lation. The Absolute develops by a sort of self-aliena- 



170 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tion into nature, and so passes into "alterity," or other- 
ness than itself. Not content with this marvellous exile 
in a foreign sphere, it seeks to return to its identity. 
The leap would be too sudden, the transition too abrupt, 
from nature to the Absolute ; though one, for the life of 
him, cannot see why, if it was accomplished to nature, it 
might not as well be effected from it. The passage, in 
this wonderful circumnavigation, is first made from 
nature to spirit, and then back to the Absolute. The 
self-alienation is completely removed, and there ensues 
an absolute self-reconciliation. We are not told, by the 
narrators of this transcendental voyage, what, after the 
Absolute has got home to itself, becomes of nature ; but 
that in passing. What is here emphasized is the con- 
fession, uttered by these deep, very deep, thinkers who 
wore the crown of the Kantian development, of the 
otherness of matter to spirit, and their desperate conatus 
to reduce the formidable alterity to the repose of indif- 
ference, the unity of identity. A becomes, by self- 
estrangement, non-A, and again non-A becomes A in 
that transcendent sphere in which all difference disap- 
pears, and contradiction and identity are one and the 
same in the bosom of the Absolute. A German may 
perhaps get a glimpse of some meaning in all this, but 
an Englishman, unless he chanced to be born of a Ger- 
man mother, may safely be defied to point out where, in 
this profound "history of God," one spark of intelligi- 
bility gleams. He would exclaim, Matter I know, and 
spirit I know, but who is this material-spiritual Abso- 
lute? 

It is no wonder that Kant is reported to have had no 



Pantheism. 171 

use for Christianity, and that he applied to man in his 
present moral condition the superlative nonsense of the 
aphorism : Because I ought, I can ; that Fichte groaned 
out the mournful lament: I myself am the dream of a 
dream ; that Schelling regarded "the so-called Bible" 1 
as the greatest hindrance to the progress of true religion ; 
and, with the ecstasy of the lunatic, affected to gaze in 
the rapture of intellectual intuition upon the Absolute 
itself; and that Hegel reached the climax (or the 
bathos) of human speculation in the identity of the Abso- 
lute and Nothing ! Nor is it any wonder that, when from 
the summit to which these eagles of philosophic fancy 
had soared, the "down-grade" began, Schopenhauer 
should have pointed to pessimism as the last iron-bound 
station of poor, human nature, the only escape from 
which is through the impossible negation of all appetite, 
desire and volition, or that Hartmann should have found 
in "the unconscious" the final goal of philosophy. In 
one respect, perhaps he was right: in the judgment of 
charity he may have been unconscious of the folly that 
he wrote. 

3. Consciousness affirms the existence of finite sub- 
stances, and the difference of one from another. If this 
testimony be refused, an end is put to argument: the 
foundation of philosophy is destroyed. If it be accepted 
it is impossible to reduce different substances to unity 
upon another substance; for — 

(1) As it is absurd to regard substance as mode, one 
substance cannot be a mode of another substance. 

1 Schwegler, Hist. Phil., Sec. xliii., Schelling. 



172 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

(2) Two differing substances cannot be modes of a 
common substance. 

(3) We would have different substantial manifesta- 
tions of one and the same substance ; which is not only 
inconceivable, but absurd. 

4. The pantheist holds that the universe is an evolu- 
tion of the primordial substance. Its phenomena are 
modes of that substance ; but the law of evolution can- 
not, without absurdity, be conceived to operate in the 
production of contrasted and contradictory modes. It 
is manifest, however, unless our faculties cheat us, that 
these modes are often contrasted and sometimes contra- 
dictory. This alleged process of evolution is, therefore, 
self-destructive. It is, of course, conceivable that con- 
trasts, leading to ultimate unity, should characterize 
the government of a free intelligence, who is not only 
necessary substance, but elective cause; but the same 
is not predicable of a process enforced simply by im- 
personal necessity. The pantheist's Becoming is sui- 
cidal, his necessary substance the source of conflicting 
forces. Like the Spartan boy, it utters no groan while 
in the cloak of its dignity is enfolded the fox which is 
gnawing at its vitals. 

Either this one substance — relatively one — is charac- 
terized by intrinsic unity, or it is not. If it is, it is 
impossible to see how contradictory modes can manifest 
it. If it is not, there is no unity predicable of the 
fluctuating phenomena of the universe. They have no 
common ground. Nothing but chance and contingency 
emerge. Law is denied, and chaos is the principle of the 
world. How God can be affirmed it passes the power of 



Pantheism. 173 

reason to conjecture. Let it be observed, that the pan- 
theist denies the existence of personal, creative will. 
He must, then, account for change in the manifestations 
of the impersonal substance upon some other ground. 
What other ground ? Evolution ? That supposes unity 
in the thing evolved. Is it necessity ? That equally 
infers unity. If a number of primordial forces be 
postulated to account for inconsistent manifestations, 
the relative unity of the primordial substance is denied ; 
but that the pantheist affirms : it is the core of his theory. 
So that if intrinsic unity be affirmed or denied of the 
primordial substance, the pantheist is confronted by in- 
superable difficulties. 

II. Against the pantheistic doctrine of the imperson- 
ality of God as the Absolute substance the following 
arguments are submitted : 

1. The consciousness of our own personality irre- 
sistibly leads to the inference of God's personality. It 
is an indubitable faith-judgment. 

(1) This may be conclusively proved upon panthe- 
istic grounds themselves. Most pantheists admit the 
fact of our own personality as attested by consciousness. 
Indeed, they maintain the extraordinary position that 
God comes to personal consciousness in man ; but their 
theory necessarily involves the evolution of the finite 
and phenomenal from the one infinite substance. This 
law of evolution supposes that the thing evolved is, at 
least, virtually and potentially in that from which the 
evolution proceeds. This has been the old, accepted 
view, as the etymology of the term evolution indicates. 
The declaration is both surprising and revolutionary, 



174 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

which is made by Professor Sully, in the last edition of 
the Encyclopedia Britannica, that this view is no longer 
held by evolutionists; that what they now understand 
by the law of evolution is the law of progress. The Pro- 
fessor performs a singular and conspicuous function: 
he pulls down the flag of evolution, and hauls up another 
in its place. The terms of the controversy are changed, 
the issue is shifted. It is no longer evolution, but pro- 
gression, whatever that may mean. Believing that the 
evolutionary pantheist will not accede to this incontinent 
surrender of his old principles, I proceed with the argu- 
ment upon the supposition that his prescriptive views 
are retained. 

If the thing evolved is implicit e in the evolver, as our 
admitted personality must, according to the pantheist, 
be evolved from God, it follows that he must be poten- 
tially possessed of personality : he cannot be impersonal. 
In fact, the denomination by the pantheist of God as 
He is a concession wrung from him to God's personality. 
For, the hypothesis, that in this particular he speaks 
metaphorically, would be very like an insult to one who 
professes to sink the imagination in the profoundest 
speculations of the pure reason. To return from this 
slight digression : it is impossible that personality could 
be evolved from impersonality. The proposition that 
God comes to personal consciousness in the personality 
of man, if it mean anything, must mean that he origi- 
nally possessed a potential personality. If it does not 
signify that, it is meaningless. If the pantheist concede 
this, he gives up his doctrine of the impersonality of 
God. If he deny it, he gives up his doctrine of the evo- 



Pantheism. 175 

lution of the finite from the infinite. The dilemma is 
fatal. 

Granted, then, that we are personal beings, it follows, 
from the essential principles of the pantheistic theory, 
that God is personal. Were he not, we could not be ; if 
we be, he must be. 

If it be replied, that the impersonal substance devel- 
ops, by a process of Becoming, into personality, the 
rejoinder is easy, that, upon such a supposition, perfec- 
tion is denied to the perfect Being, fulness to the In- 
finite; that a change occurs in the absolute substance, 
not merely in its manifestations, but in its very essence ; 
and, finally, that this change is a degradation of the 
infinite and absolute into the finite and relative: an 
unbecoming Becoming, forsooth ! This is but an instance 
of that amazing circumgyratory process — already ad- 
verted to — by which the Absolute abdicates its crown 
in order to enjoy the pleasure of resuming it ; by which 
it first "steps down and out" in order to step up 
and in ! 

(2) There is another method by which the same con- 
clusion may be reached upon the principles of panthe- 
ism. Are we possessed of personality ? If the pantheist 
answers in the affirmative, it follows that, as we are 
not different from God, but are manifestations of his 
substance, God is personal in our personality; which is 
to relinquish the doctrine of his impersonality. Is that 
denied ? It follows that God and we are not one, and the 
fundamental assumption of pantheism is abandoned. 

(3) If it be admitted that God, originally impersonal, 
comes to personal consciousness in man, it follows that 



176 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

man is God improved; for it must be granted that a 
being possessed of personality is greater than one desti- 
tute of it; and if God had it not until he attains it in 
man, humanity is the crown of the divine development, 
the climax of the divine glory ; and then these ineffable 
absurdities result : that the absolute and infinite reaches 
a higher degree of perfection in the finite, that infinite 
strength is supplemented by finite weakness, and that 
God is conscious of increased excellence in beings who 
are, if honest, obliged to confess their degradation from 
their first ideal, and to criminate themselves for folly, 
meanness and shame. 

The force of this reduction to absurdity could only 
be blunted by showing that personality, instead of being 
a perfection, is really an imperfection. Without labor- 
ing to refute this paradox, it is sufficient to say that the 
whole fabric of human society, of the family, the church, 
and the state — the whole social development of man — 
rests on the fact of personality as its corner-stone. Re- 
move it, and mankind becomes a mere aggregation of 
units, with no relation subsisting between them but the 
possession by each individual of a nature similar to that 
of others. Every impersonal man would be a machine, 
like an ancient war-chariot, armed with scythes to mow 
down the impersonal machines around him ; just as the 
impersonal God of the pantheist, a centre of repulsion 
to the universe, can only become a centre of attraction 
by borrowing his personality from man ; that is, as he 
and man are one, he is both a centre of repulsion and one 
of attraction, both impersonal and personal, at the same 
time ! 



Pantheism. 177 

It may be urged that this argument is inconsistent, 
inasmuch as, at one time, it charges the pantheist with 
degrading the Infinite substance by representing it as 
descending to the finite, and, at another, imputes to him 
the absurdity of elevating it by conceiving it as coming 
to personal consciousness in man. The inconsistency 
is not in the argument, but in the self-repugnant ele- 
ments of the pantheistic theory. It is that theory which 
develops the Absolute downwards, even into physical 
nature, and again develops it upwards into human con- 
sciousness. The argument has only pursued it into its 
own self-destroying absurdities. 

(4) If God comes to personal consciousness in. man, 
he must have as many personal consciousnesses as there 
are men, and, therefore, would be as many persons as 
there are men; for a personal humanity which is not 
individual would be contradictory to our fundamental 
conceptions. The solemn processes of human law, 
which, with all their weighty results, are based upon the 
notion of personal rights, would be a tissue of farces. 
The only escape from the above-mentioned absurd conse- 
quence would lie in maintaining the view that person- 
ality attaches to generic humanity alone, and not to 
individual human beings ; and that is so extravagant a 
supposition that it is not asserted even by those who, 
like Cousin, affirm the impersonality of the human rea- 
son. But if it be conceded that God is not as many 
persons as there are human persons, nor generic hu- 
manity as personal, it is admitted that men as persons 
are different from God; and then the following conse- 
quences ensue: first, the pantheistic theory is aban- 



178 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

doned, for it asserts the identity of man with God ; and, 
secondly, man being possessed of personality and God 
not, man would pro tanto be greater than God, the finite 
greater than the infinite ; and such an absurdity it would 
take the capacity of an Absolutist speculator to swallow. 

(5) The consciousness of personality involves the 
necessary judgment that other persons are different from 
ourselves ; but it is absurd to say that different and often 
conflicting personalities are evolved from an impersonal 
substance. That personality should be evolved from 
impersonality is contradictory enough; but that mil- 
lions of personalities differing from each other and 
frequently contending to death against each other should 
be evolved from one impersonal substance — this is a 
contradiction of contradictions. 

(6) Consciousness delivers to us the law of causality 
as fundamental to our constitution. The chief empi- 
rical condition upon which that law is elicited into 
energy is furnished by the will. Will supposes per- 
sonality. Thus we get personal will which is causal — 
so far as the production of phenomenal changes is con- 
cerned. If we cannot infer the causality of God's per- 
sonal will, we are confronted by two results : first, our 
personal causality could not have been evolved from the 
divine substance, and that would contravene pantheistic 
principles; and, secondly, we would be greater than 
God, and that would contradict reason and religion 
alike. 

2. It is one of the elements of pantheism, that the 
primordial substance is simply a necessary substance, 
destitute of personality and elective freedom, and an- 



Pantheism. 179 

other is, that all its cosmical manifestations, involving 
innumerable changes, are determined by an invincible 
necessity. These co-existent elements of the scheme are 
contradictory to each other ; and, if this can be evinced, 
the theory will be proved to be fatally, because self- 
destructively, inconsistent with itself. 

A merely necessary, an impersonal, substance — if the 
terms mean anything — is one which must immutably be 
precisely what it is. It can, at no period of its existence, 
be other than it eternally was ; for, if it change, it is not, 
ex hypothesi, what it once was; which is the same as 
to say that it was not necessarily what it was. Change 
implies something more than simple necessity. Was it 
necessary that it should have always been what it was ? 
This question must be answered affirmatively, upon the 
supposition that it ever was a necessary substance. A 
simply necessary substance which changes is a contradic- 
tion in terms. 

Several answers may be given to this argument against 
the consistency of pantheism : 

(1) It may be said that the necessary substance is 
free. This was maintained by Spinoza. He attributed 
to the substance which he called God a free necessity; 
but what he meant by this language was merely a spon- 
taneous necessity, or a necessary spontaneity ; it matters 
not which ; and to say that this exhausts the notion of 
freedom is to contradict the most obvious facts of con- 
sciousness and observation ; and if from them we cannot 
reason by analogy to God's freedom, we use the term 
without any definite meaning when we apply it to him. 
By analogy, I say, but an analogy which, while real, is 



180 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

of course checked and modified by the infinite distance 
between ourselves as finite and God as infinite. Now 
there is another sort of freedom than that of spontaneity. 
It is that of otherwise determining, facultas aliter se 
determinandi — the power to elect between contrary 
alternatives. With spontaneity necessity may coincide, 
but not with the latter kind of freedom. But take the 
position of the pantheist as he states it, it follows that 
whatever direction the spontaneity originally took, that 
direction it must always take. It proceeds by the law 
of evolution, and all evolution is necessity; but some 
of the changes which occur in the phenomenal manifes- 
tations of the primordial substance are changes which 
involve contrast and contradiction. The change from 
holiness to sin, or from sin to holiness, from a good 
character to a bad, or from a bad to a good, are clear 
instances of this kind. These changes it is simply im- 
possible to adjust to the hypothesis of mere spontaneity. 
To say that there may be a spontaneous change from 
good to bad, or from bad to good, is to speak absurdly. 
If a thing is necessarily good, it cannot become bad ; if 
necessarily bad,, it cannot become good. The necessary 
freedom, or the free necessity, of the pantheist cannot 
account for changes which actually occur. If it be said 
that such changes do not occur, the ground is taken that 
our faculty of observation is mendacious, and then its 
testimony to the occurrence of any changes is untrust- 
worthy; and consequently the affirmation of the pan- 
theist, that the one substance manifests itself in phe- 
nomenal changes, has no foundation upon which to rest. 
He simply raves when he uses such language. 



Pantheism. 181 

(2) It may be urged that the primordial substance is 
also a necessary and eternal cause, that is, a cause acting 
necessarily and eternally. This is self-contradictory. 
A cause, if human language is worth anything, is the 
correlative of an effect. A necessary and eternal cause 
supposes a necessary and eternal effect ; but an effect is 
a thing which begins to be. As necessary and eternal it 
could not begin; as effect it must have begun. Such 
an effect is one, therefore, which begun to be, and did 
not begin to be. If, then, the Absolute substance was a 
necessary and eternal cause, it was a necessary and eter- 
nal contradiction. 

Further, if it were not only an eternally operating, 
but an infinitely operating, cause, as even Cousin con- 
tends, and was eternally determined by necessity to put 
forth its causal energy infinitely, it follows that the 
universe must have been eternal and complete. There 
could be no room for farther exertion of causal efficiency, 
and, consequently, no room for change. The universe 
must continue to be immutably and exactly what it 
eternally was; but changing phenomena are affirmed 
by the pantheist as manifestations of the primordial 
substance. Here, then, we have another self contradic- 
tion ; and still further, the universe must be infinite as 
well as eternal. If not, a part only of the infinite sub- 
stance was determined by necessity to causal exertion, 
and a part not, which would be contradictory to the 
position that the infinite substance as one is determined 
by necessity ; but if the universe be infinite, there could 
be no finite changes of which it would be suscejDtible. If 
there were, the infinite would be finite, and another con- 



182 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tradiction emerges, which none but an assertor of an 
infinito-finite substance could stomach. 

(3) It may be contended that, as the theist admits the 
necessity of the divine Being, he is encumbered by the 
very difficulties which have been urged against the pan- 
theist. To meet this charge it is hardly needful to do 
more than state the positions of the respective parties. 
Both agreeing that God is a necessary substance, they 
differ in the following respects: The pantheist denies 
that he is a person; the theist affirms that he is. The 
pantheist, so far as he admits that he is cause, holds 
that he is so by virtue of an immanent necessity ; that 
is, he never transcends the limits of his own being, but 
simply evolves its contents: he never creates. The 
theist holds that God is a free cause ; that is, he is free 
to create or not to create, to exercise or not to exercise 
certain of his perfections — at least, to manifest or not 
certain aspects of his perfections, in relation to objects 
which, as created, are not himself. 

While, therefore, the pantheist makes a necessary sub- 
stance change, as such, the theist is chargeable with no 
such inconsistency: he holds that, as substance, God 
abides unchanged and unchangeable. While the pan- 
theist makes the Infinite become finite, the theist is not 
guilty of that huge contradiction: he holds that the 
Infinite God creates the finite. The pantheist makes 
phenomena manifestations of the primordial substance 
itself, in this sense, that they are its modes; the theist 
holds that phenomena are effects of the causal will of 
God. When he says that God manifests himself finitely, 
he does not intend to assert, with the pantheist, the 



Pantheism. 183 

supreme contradiction that the finite is part of the 
Infinite, but that the finite products of the will of 
God, reveal, to a certain extent, his existence and na- 
ture. 

The pantheist ascribes only spontaneity to his abso- 
lute substance; the theist also attributes elective free- 
dom to God, that is, the freedom which elects between 
alternatives. This is a point of great consequence. It 
is, it is almost needless to say, the doctrine of the theist 
that God is spontaneously and necessarily holy. Holi- 
ness is his life — the infinite love of the infinite norm 
of rectitude in his being and character. Xecessarily 
holy, he cannot act except holily ; but it is not his doc- 
trine that God is under the necessity of acting whenever 
he acts. He is not fate ; he is a free, Personal Cause. 
Between acts which are alike holy he is free to choose ; 
and he is free to perform a conceivable act which is 
holy, or to abstain from performing it. The pantheist 
holds that the universe is a necessary emanation of the 
primordial substance; but the theist maintains that 
God, in the exercise of his elective freedom, might, con- 
sistently with his intrinsic holiness and happiness, have 
refrained from creating the universe. 

The pantheist will, in reply, allege that the theist is 
obliged to admit change in the modes of the divine will, 
as, for example, a change from a will purposing to 
create and a will actually to create. Concerning that 
question I have spoken elsewhere, and will now make 
but a single remark. Let it be conceded that the theist 
encounters the difficulty of at least an apparent change 
in the modes of the divine will, that difficulty is vastly 



184- Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

less than that created by the pantheist's doctrine of 
change in the divine substance. In the one case there 
is a modification of an attribute, in the other of the 
essence which grounds attributes. It may be said that 
the distinction is without a difference — that the attri- 
butes and essence of God are identical. It is true that 
some theologians maintain — I cannot help thinking for 
utterly insufficient reasons — that view, although out of 
all analogy with our convictions in regard to our own 
constitution, in regard to our souls essentially consid- 
ered, and the powers which manifest them. £sTo strenu- 
ous endeavor to secure unity can avail to obliterate the 
venerable distinction between substance and attribute, 
or to reduce intelligence and will to one and the same 
attribute, identical with each other because identical 
with the same essence. 

3. We are conscious, at least to some extent — to what 
extent will not now be inquired — of elective freedom 
as causal agents — that is, freedom to do or not to do 
certain acts. This kind of liberty is utterly incon- 
sistent with the evolution of a substance proceeding in 
all its modifications upon the principle of rigid necessity, 
the principle demanded by the pantheistic theory. 

(1) This elective freedom — to do or not to do, to 
choose between differing alternatives — cannot, without 
contradiction, be supposed to be evolved from necessity. 
For whatever necessarily is could not possibly be other- 
wise; If it could be, one and the same thing would be 
necessarily determined in two different directions. 

(2) Elective freedom, if evolved, requires an elec- 
tively free substance from which it is evolved ; but an 



Pantheism. 185 

electively free substance must be personal. It is 
absurd to ascribe suck freedom to impersonal sub- 
stance. 

(3) If we are electively free, God is electively free, or 
we are freer than God ; but if he be electively free, he is 
a personal cause who may or may not, in certain respects, 
exercise his causal efficiency. 

4. TTe are conscious of moral qualities. Among the 
facts to which consciousness distinctly and unequivo- 
cally testifies is a sense of duty, necessarily inferring 
moral responsibility. This calls for an objective law- 
giver, ruler and judge, or our moral nature is a lie ; but 
to talk of an impersonal substance as administering 
moral law is to utter unmeaning gibberish. Our moral 
nature, therefore, demands a personal God. 

But, if he be an impersonal substance — let the sole- 
cism be pardoned — and human beings, as moral, are 
necessary, finite modifications of him or it( !), one of 
two positions must be assumed by the pantheist : either 
there are no such things as moral distinctions, and sin 
and crime, as manifestations of God, are good ; or these 
distinctions are admitted to be valid, and then the same 
impersonal substance, proceeding by the law of neces- 
sity, evolves itself in the most contradictory modes. If 
the first of these alternatives be elected, and the distinc- 
tions between sin and holiness, duty and crime, are 
held to be nothing, pantheism stands self-convicted of 
being, what some caustic writer pronounces it, Pandia- 
bolism. If the second alternative be chosen, and a neces- 
sary and impersonal substance be held to evolve itself 
in albsolutely contradictory modes, the system which 



186 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

would necessitate such a doctrine would relinquish its 
title to be considered rational. It would be a philosophy 
for a madhouse. 

5. If God were an impersonal substance, it is perfectly 
obvious that religion would be an impossibility. Any 
pretence to it would be a mockery and a sham. If we 
cannot say, Thou, to God, it needs no argument to 
convince us that we can neither pray to him, nor praise 
him, nor obey him. To say, He, Him, would be to 
contradict the fundamental principle of the theory: to 
call an impersonal substance He, would be to make the 
impersonal personal. If we could be supposed to wor- 
ship what we term God at all, we would, of course, begin 
our homage with the address : O Impersonal Substance, 
infinite, eternal, and changeable, we besesch It to hear 
us. Let its blind eye look upon us; let its deaf ear 
listen to the voice of our supplications ; let its heart, that 
knows no pity, commiserate our necessities; let its 
"infinite and eternal energy" that has no hands supply 
our wants and relieve our woes ! Is it not inexplicable 
that some theologians, in a semi-apologetic tone, should 
allow themselves to concede the religious warmth and 
fervor of such a system ? Warm ? It is colder than 
"the rocks on Torneo's hoary brow." It takes away our 
God, the source of light and love, and leaves us to freeze 
in the darkness of despair. 

But experience in moments of critical emergency 
proves that the religion which demands a personal God 
cannot be pitched out of our nature with the fork of a 
perverse speculation. We instinctively cry for help to 
one who is able to save unto the uttermost; and this 



Pantheism. 187 

"sure instinct of prayer' 7 is vindicated by the judicial 
reflections of reason. 

It constitutes one of the most formidable counts in the 
indictment of this impious and detestable hypothesis 
that, driving us with our worship from the altar of God, 
it not only legitimates, but logically necessitates the 
worship of man. God comes to consciousness in man. 
If, therefore, we are to worship at all, inasmuch as we 
can only worship a conscious God, we must offer our 
homage to man. This is the climax of execrable wicked- 
ness. The worship of leeks, onions and garlic, I hesitate 
not to say, would be preferable to this spume of Schelling 
and Hegel, Carlyle and Compte, Emerson and Mill. If 
we must enthrone a creature in the seat of God, by all 
means let it be a vegetable or a reptile rather than the 
monster who first dethrones his Maker, and then usurps 
his crown. If a hero is called for to receive conspicuous 
worship, a hero of more than a hundred battles, let the 
Devil be summoned to the throne. He has more being, 
more intelligence, more courage and more impiety than 
any of the sons of men, and no man would be restrained 
from worshipping him by the personal consciousness of 
the Devil's sins. But that one conscious of his own 
wickedness should worship himself, or a sinner like him- 
self, or fallen humanity idealized, sublimated, apothe- 
osized — this is the consummation of folly and crime, and 
were it universal the damnation of the race would 
slumber not. 

6. Were this doctrine true, it would follow that indi- 
vidual immortality would be impossible. What would 
be the individual \ A phenomenon "that appeareth for a 



188 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

little time, and then vanisheth away;" glittering for a 
moment on the surface of infinite being, like phospho- 
rescent foam on the sea, and then re-absorbed into the 
impersonal substance whence, for its brief hour, it 
emerged. The future, the unutterable glory, the trans- 
cendent heavenly home, the blissful fellowship with 
God and angels, which Christianity reveals — all would 
be swept away by the besom of this desolating doctrine ; 
and this is the philosophy we are asked to accept in the 
place of the gospel ! 

7. The pantheistic theory renders miracles impos- 
sible. That a system proceeding by an undeviating reign 
of necessity should admit of supernatural interpositions 
is, of course, inconceivable. The position of the pan- 
theist is logically taken, when he denies the possibility of 
miracles; but were that true, God cannot prove a 
religion to be from him. Christianity is incapable of 
being proved. What remains ? a Let us eat and drink ; 
to-morrow we die." They have taken away our Saviour, 
our God, our heaven : let us wallow like swine in the 
sty of Epicurus ! 

III. The third leading feature of the pantheistic 
theory is its denial of creation. That, on the assumption 
of the existence of the material and spiritual systems, 
they are not identical has in the previous discussions 
been evinced. Idealism and materialism have been 
shown to be destitute of adequate support. They are 
paradoxes which traverse the common sense of mankind. 
It is now proposed briefly to show that the universe is 
finite, and, therefore, was created. 

1. Matter is finite. 



Pantheism. 189 

(1) This is the common belief of the race. The pre- 
sumption is terribly against one who would contradict it. 

(2) Matter is divisible. The fact that division cannot 
be actually effected in some cases affords no proof that 
matter is incapable of division. The experiments of the 
laboratory prove the belief that matter can be further 
divided than it has been. The quest for a minimum 
stimulates the effort to go on with division. 

(3) If matter is divisible, it is mutable. 

(4) If it be divisible and mutable, it cannot be in- 
finite. A divisible and mutable infinite is a contradic- 
tion in terms. 

(5) We necessarily infer from the facts of conscious- 
ness that our bodies are finite. One absolutely knows 
that his body cannot pass through the desk on which he 
writes. Our material organisms are limited and con- 
ditioned on every side. It is certain that some matter 
is finite. 

(6) If some matter is finite, no matter can be infinite. 
Otherwise, we would have infinite matter plus finite 
matter, which is a contradiction. 

Unless it can be shown that there is a general sub- 
stance of matter, of which material phenomena are 
special manifestations, it is not difficult to see that the 
substance of matter is finite. Every phenomenal form 
or manifestation of matter is evidently finite; and if 
the material substance, which we are led by a funda- 
mental belief to infer, is one which corresponds with 
such specific phenomena, the only general notion we 
can frame of the substance of matter is that of a con- 
geries of special and, therefore, finite substances. If 



190 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

that were admitted, it would follow that, as what is 
predicable of all the parts is predicable of the whole, 
and finiteness is predicable of all material substances, 
finiteness is predicable of the substance of matter as a 
whole. But it is impossible to prove the existence of a 
generic substance of matter which reduces all material 
phenomena to unity. If that be so, it is impossible to 
prove the infinity of matter. 

This reasoning is countenanced by the speculations 
of those philosophers who have affirmed the eternity of 
matter, and the admissions of scientific men of the 
present day. The atoms of Democritus were the very 
opposite of an infinite whole ; and the ultimate particles 
■ — the elements, molecules, or what-not — of atheistic 
evolutionists are equally so. To assert the infinity of 
separate, and, therefore, limited and conditioned, atoms, 
is to affirm a contradiction. We are at liberty, then, to 
return to the position that as some matter is finite no 
matter can be infinite. 

To this it may be objected, that the same reasoning 
would prove that no spirit can be infinite ; but the objec- 
tion does not hold, because the analogy which grounds it 
is deceptive. Material bodies have the property of dis- 
placing, at least, of limiting and conditioning, other 
material bodies ; but the same cannot be proved of spirit. 
It may be so, but we do not, and, for aught that appears 
to the contrary, cannot know it. Until, however, it can 
be shown that spirit must displace spirit, it cannot be 
inferred from the fact that there are some finite spirits, 
that no spirit can be infinite. There may be a spirit 
which pervades all matter, and every other spirit, uncon- 



Pantheism. 191 

ditioned and -unlimited by either. For this we have the 
testimony of the Bible. Its positive doctrine as to the 
infinity of the divine Spirit cannot be legitimately con- 
tradicted by any merely probable speculations. 

The remark has just been made that the existence of 
one general substance of matter cannot be proved, and 
that it is, therefore, impossible to prove the infinity of 
matter. But is it possible to furnish positive proof that 
there cannot be such a general substance of matter ? 

We reach the substance of matter alone by inference. 
It is not an object of perception, of consciousness. It 
is not presentatively given, and, consequently, cannot 
be presentatively known. That which is perceived, and, 
therefore, immediately known, is phenomenal proper- 
ties. From them we are led by an irresistible law of 
belief immediately and necessarily to infer the substance 
to which they belong, which they manifest, and upon 
which they are collected into unity. 'Now, it may be 
safely affirmed that the substance cannot be more exten- 
sive than the sum of its phenomenal properties. Are 
they limited? So must it be. But each phenomenal 
property is limited. It would be absurd to deny this. 
If all are limited, the sum is necessarily limited, or 
contradiction emerges ; for it is universally granted that 
what is true of all the parts of a whole is true of the 
whole itself. 

Are we, then, justified in inferring from the fact of 
the sum of material properties being limited, that the 
substance is limited to which they pertain ? We are ; 
for the only knowledge we can have of material sub- 
stance is derived from its properties. If there could be 



192 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

material substance greater than the aggregate of its 
properties, it would be unknown to us and unknowable 
by us. Not only would it be impossible to affirm its 
existence — for how could we assert that to exist of which 
we know nothing ? — but such substance could not exist, 
for the reason that it would be, to some extent, unquali- 
fied by any property — that is, to the extent to which it 
would transcend properties. Substance and property, 
like husband and wife, are correlatives: no wife, no 
husband; no property, no substance. The very term 
substance would lose its significance and become an 
unmeaning cipher, if it were not used as related to 
property. No part of matter, therefore, can be un- 
qualified by properties ; but it is certain that the com- 
plement of material properties is finite; consequently 
the whole of material substance must also be finite. 

2. Our spirits are finite. This requires no protracted 
argument. 

(1) We are conscious of the limitation of our facul- 
ties. He who would deny the fact would afford the 
strongest proof that his faculties are limited. 

(2) We know by observation and testimony that there 
are other human spirits than our own. They limit and 
condition each other, and are, therefore, all of them 
finite. If there be non-human spirits, which we have 
reason to believe, their difference from ourselves, and 
their plurality, would prove them to be finite, for many 
differing infinites would be a supreme contradiction. 

3. If both matter and spirits, human and non-human, 
are finite, the universe which is composed of them is 
finite. But if finite, it began. 



Pantheism. 193 

Here it may be contended that, although the universe 
may be conceded not to be infinite, still it may be eter- 
nal ; but if it be finite, it follows conclusively that it can- 
not be eternal ; for bvery finite thing must have had a be- 
ginning. If it had ho beginning it would in one respect 
be infinite — that is, as to duration, which is contrary 
to the supposition, and that a thing should be partly 
infinite and partly finite, finito-infinite, would be self- 
repugnant and absurd. If, then, the universe is finite, 
it began; if it began, it cannot be eternal; for eternity 
is without beginning and end. 

Again. Either mind and matter are co-eternal, or 
matter precedes mind, or mind precedes matter. The 
first supposition would destroy the infinity of both, for 
they would limit and condition each other ; but if mat- 
ter connot be infinite, it cannot be eternal. The second 
supposition is met by the following presumption: Our 
experience teaches us that matter never changes its 
formal type, except by the action of intelligence upon it. 
A log of wood, or a block of stone, only passes into struc- 
tural shape and order by virtue of the purpose and skill 
of the human mind. A statue is never the result of 
merely material forces; not even a fowl-coop is. As 
mind precedes the arrangement of matter into order 
and beauty, we warrantably infer that intelligence pre- 
ceded the cosmical organization of the universe. As the 
organization of matter never, experience being our in- 
formant, issues in intelligence, but the contrary is true, 
it is a presumption, at least, that intelligence precedes 
the existence of matter. The whole force of analogy 
would go to show that, if matter and mind are not co- 



194 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

eternal, mind precedes matter. It is absurd to suppose 
that intelligence is the last result of evolution, for the 
contemplation of such a result of the process must have 
proceeded from intelligence. If man be the crown of 
race-development in this world, then there must have 
been at its beginning an intelligence at least equal to 
that of man. The supposition that germ-cells, or any 
infinitesimal particles of matter, could without intelli- 
gence, without plan, without direction, have developed 
themselves into the City of God, or the Principia, or the 
Paradise Lost, is inconceivably absurd. Intelligence be- 
gins where the end is intelligence. Why not admit a 
creating God, and end the business ? 

What has been said with reference to matter will 
apply with increased emphasis to mind. 

4. If the universe began, there are two alternatives; 
either it came into existence spontaneously, or it is an 
effect produced by a cause other than itself — either it 
was uncaused or caused. 

(1) It could not exist spontaneously. Both meta- 
physics and physics consign the hypothesis to the cate- 
gory of impossibilities. Spontaneous existence would 
be an absolute commencement. That supposition would 
contradict the fundamental belief of the human mind, 
that everything which begins to be has a cause; and 
would, moreover, involve the self-contradiction that the 
same thing is at once cause and effect. The attempt of 
Sir William Hamilton to show that in the free causation 
of the human will we find an instance of absolute com- 
mencement has, in a preceding discussion, been evinced 
to be groundless. 



Pantheism. 195 

In this independent and impregnable judgment actual 
experiments, eagerly and exhaustively instituted, have 
led physical science to concur, as is illustrated by the 
following utterance of Professor Huxley : 

" For my own part, I conceive that with the particulars of 
M. Pasteur's experiments before us, we cannot fail to arrive at 
his conclusion, and that the doctrine of Spontaneous Generation 
has received a final coup de grace." x 

(2) The universe is an effect of a cause other than 
itself. As it could not have been produced by itself, so 
it must have been produced by a cause antecedent and 
extraneous to itself. The only escape from this conclu- 
sion is in supposing it to have been absolutely uncaused. 
The argument may be resorted to which was employed 
by Kant, in order to discredit the cosmological proof of 
God's existence : If it be maintained that the principle 
of causality demands a cause for every new appearance, 
or, in general, for everything that exists, the same prin- 
ciple would exact a cause for God's existence; and, if 
it be replied that his existence is uncaused, then the 
same may be true of the existence of the universe. To 
this it is answered : 

As the world consists of finite parts we are obliged, in 
the quest of a first cause, to pass by regression through 
the series of relative effects and causes to a beginning. 
However far we may, by analysis, proceed in this regres- 
sion, we will be confronted at every step by relative pro- 
duction, of effects caused from previously existing ma- 
terial. Say that the world itself may have been produced 
out of pre-existent material, this only shifts the question 

1 Orig. Species, Lect., III. 



196 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

from this world to the universe. We are forced to ask 
the cause of the universe — of matter itself. Here the 
same process is necessary, of a regression through finite 
effects and causes to an ultimate cause. Now a regres- 
sion of the finite must conduct either to an infinite series, 
or to a beginning of the series. An infinite series is 
impossible. The old argument against it is incontestable 
— that whatsoever is predicable of all the parts of a 
whole is predicable of the whole itself. Every part of 
the series is finite ; therefore, the whole series is finite ; 
but the principle of cause holding, we must believe that 
the universe had a cause. This cause could not have 
been itself. E concesso, spontaneous generation is ruled 
out. It could not have been in the initial point of the 
series, for that is contrary to the previous concession, and 
would make the first element in the series both cause 
and effect — the effect of itself. The universe must have 
had a cause outside of itself. Whatever, then, may be 
held in regard to God, as caused or uncaused, it is clear 
that the universe could not have been uncaused. It can- 
not be inferred that if God is uncaused, so may the uni- 
verse be. Kant's may be uncaused is met by the positive 
proof that it" is caused. Otherwise, our intellectual 
nature is fundamentally false ; and were that granted, 
no dependence could be placed upon the testimony of 
our moral nature to God's existence, a testimony which, 
Kant contended, was alone incapable of subversion. Our 
nature is one, and the tongues of all her powers unite 
in the mia glossa, which affirms and worships God. We 
have now reached the conclusion that the universe was 
caused by a power other than itself. 



Pantheism. 197 

5. A cause which begins existence is creative; and 
the cause which began and, therefore, created the uni- 
verse is God, who is himself uncaused. 

Although the principle of cause is applicable to all 
finite existence, it cannot be applied to an infinite sub- 
stance. What is, in this respect, predicable of the finite 
is not of the infinite. God must be an exception to the 
scope of the principle ; for the cause of the universe, as 
a series of finite elements, must have been either in or 
out of itself. In itself, it has been shown, it could not 
have been. Out of itself, therefore, it must have been. 
If not in, but out of, itself, it could not be finite, for all 
that is finite is in the universe, and that supposition is 
excluded. It must, therefore, be infinite, since between 
finite and infinite there is no middle supposition pos- 
sible. If the cause of the universe be infinite, it could 
not have been caused, for an effect is conditioned by its 
cause; but this cause, being infinite, must be uncondi- 
tioned, or a contradiction ensues. 

Still further, there can be but one such Being, who, 
himself uncaused, is the Cause of all else. 

First. There cannot be two infinite substances, or 
two infinite causes. The supposition is self-contradic- 
tory. 

Second. This Being must be either caused by some- 
thing out of himself, or caused by himself, or uncaused. 
The first supposition is impossible, for the infinite can- 
not begin, nor be conditioned. The second is inadmis- 
sible, if for no other reason for these: that cause and 
effect would be identical, which is absurd, and God 
would be represented as being before he began to be, or 



198 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

as beginning after he already was ; which is, if possible, 
still more absurd. The third supposition, consequently, 
is true : the Being who is the cause of the universe is 
uncaused. He is, therefore, independent and uncondi- 
tioned. Another supposed uncaused being must like- 
wise be independent and unconditioned; but two such 
beings would at the same time be independent of and 
unconditioned by each other, and dependent on and con- 
ditioned by each other; which is an infinite contra- 
diction. 

The cause, therefore, which begins the existence of the 
universe is the Creator, and the Creator is God. 

If to all this the pantheist reply, that he holds the 
beginning of the universe as a general modification, and 
of its parts as special modifications, of the infinite sub- 
stance, the rejoinder is that this is no answer to an 
argument the purpose of which is to prove a beginning 
of the universe in the sense of origination, of production 
from no pre-existent substance. If that proof has been 
established, the pantheist's so-called beginning by evolu- 
tion or emanation has been disproved. According to 
him an exploding rocket and the commencement of the 
universe are on the same footing, except that the former 
is a lesser and the latter a greater educt of the same pri- 
mordial substance. The alternatives are: the creation 
of the universe, or its eternity. If created, it was not 
eternal ; and the pantheistic hypothesis fails. 

A few observations, in conclusion, will be made in 
regard to the fundamental errors of the pantheistic 
school. 

1. The distinction between substance and property, 



Pantheism. 199 

on the one hand, and cause and effect, on the other, is 
obliterated. The two categories are confounded, and 
made the subject of common predication. This is done 
with reference to the human soul itself, and, therefore, 
the plainest deliverances of consciousness are contra- 
dicted. To say that the power of thought is not a 
quality of the substance of the soul, but an effect of it 
as a cause ; or that an act of thought is a property of the 
soul, and not an effect caused by the power of thought, 
would be to deny a distinction affirmed in consciousness, 
and embodied in the languages of the race. Now an 
analogy between us and God, not in degree, but kind, is 
well-nigh universally admitted. In violating conscious- 
ness, therefore, we deny the inferences it necessitates 
with reference to the nature of God ; but the pantheist 
goes farther than this, and is, consequently, still more 
burdened with the difficulty now urged. He maintains 
the identity of man with God, and, still further, affirms 
that God comes to consciousness in man. He is, there- 
fore, involved in the contradiction of denying to God 
the distinction between substance and cause, as he is 
Absolute, and of being compelled to admit it of him, as 
he is conscious in man. But what matter ? Why urge 
self-contradiction against the logic of the pantheist when 
his infinite and necessary substance evolves and mani- 
fests itself in contradictions by virtue of the law of its 
being ? 

2. The distinction between a necessary and a free 
cause is denied. There is no need to dwell particularly 
upon this point. The argument just employed equally 
applies here. The pantheist violates alike the dictates 



200 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

of consciousness, and the demands of his own theory. 
If we are conscious of free causality, then, according to 
him, God, who comes to consciousness in us, is also 
conscious of free causality. Yet he is affirmed to be a 
necessary cause. The pantheist is confronted by a fatal 
dilemma : If he assert the development of free causality 
out of necessary, he talks nonsense ; if he deny the con- 
sciousness of free causality, he wipes out responsibility, 
subverts government and unhinges society. He is dan- 
gerous to the interests of mankind, and he and his 
school should be banished as a colony to Anticyra. A 
liberal use of hellebore might possibly qualify them for 
restoration to the fellowship of the species. 

3. The transcendental philosophers, pantheists and 
absolutists disregard the limitations upon the human 
faculties, in that they deal with the measures of faith 
as if they were the measures of thought. Since Jacobi 
vindicated himself from the charge of appealing to hu- 
man and ecclesiastical authority when he insisted upon 
faith as the organ of transcendental truth, it has become 
almost superfluous for those who, in the general, concur 
with him in that position to guard themselves from like 
gross misapprehension. The answer of that great 
thinker was sufficient — namely, that instead of invoking 
external authority, he appealed to the innermost, 
a priori principles of the soul. His defect consisted in 
divorcing the testimony of faith from the the empirical 
processes of the discursive understanding; in making 
our faith-apprehensions direct revelations, intuitions of 
transcendental facts, instead of viewing them as existing 
at first as latent aptitudes or fundamental laws, de- 



Pantheism. 201 

pending for formal expression, in the shape of inferen- 
tial judgments, upon the conscious processes of the per- 
ceptive, the representative and the comparative facul- 
ties. He affirmed too sharp a dualism between the ener- 
gies of what he properly termed the "faculty of faith" 
and those of the faculty of thought. Different in their 
nature as they are, they are closely related and interde- 
pendent in respect to their attainments. The human 
mind is one, and all its powers, however diverse, co- 
operate in the production of joint results. This much 
of a precautionary character has been briefly said in 
order to forestall any misconception with reference to 
what may follow. 

(1) These philosophers were right in affirming the 
existence of the Infinite; in treating with contempt a 
philosophy, if such it could be designated, which would 
confine itself to the narrow domain of phenomena, 
whether physical or psychological; and in demanding 
an unphenomenal reality as answering to the profound- 
est principles and yearnings of the human spirit. In a 
word, they were right in asserting the claims of ontology, 
in contradistinction to a mere scientific analysis and 
classification of the facts of external nature or of the 
mind itself. There is a degree of truth in the a priori 
arguments of such thinkers as Anselm, Descartes and 
Leibnitz for the existence of an infinite and perfect 
Being. From the lowest foundations of our nature there 
comes a cry for such a Being. He is not the creature of 
a mere negation of thought ; he is the positive affirma- 
tion of intelligence. The argument is in itself insuffi- 
cient; it cannot be completed without the complemen- 



202 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tary addition of a posteriori elements ; but it furnishes 
alike the indispensable starting point of those elements, 
and the climax of their development. Justice compels 
this acknowledgment, but — 

(2) These philosophers committed the fault, the intel- 
lectual crime, of confounding the infinite with the finite, 
the indemonstrable with the demonstrable, the incompre- 
hensible with the comprehensible. 

It is admitted that the infinite, the indemonstrable, 
the incomprehensible are, as facts, delivered to us by the 
reason in the discharge of its highest cognitive func- 
tions. But in performing this high office it acts as a 
complement of faiths, mysterious and inexplicable in 
their origin, and developed into actual judgments upon 
the empirical conditions furnished by the processes of 
the intuitive, the imaginative and the dianoetic facul- 
ties. Were we restricted to the operation of these sub- 
ordinate powers we could never apprehend infinite, in- 
demonstrable and incomprehensible realities. They are 
confined in their matter and, therefore, in their range 
to the phenomenal. There are necessary, uncontingent 
truths which transcend their scope, and, while it is true 
that to some extent they use those truths in the proced- 
ures of the reasoning faculty, they are indebted for 
the origination and delivery of them, to the reason as 
the "place of principles," the seat of faith. These first 
principles are given. The very roots from which the 
tree of knowledge grows, they belong to that funda- 
mental nature which, from the necessity of the case, 
must have been inserted by the hand which created our 
being. So far from being the results of education, the 



Pantheism. 203 

products of culture, they underlie, legitimate, necessitate 
all cognitive energy. They are the bases, not the fruits, 
of demonstration. In themselves indemonstrable, they 
must be accepted by the very necessities of our mental 
constitution, and thus accepted from the hand that laid 
the foundations of our nature, they ground the demon- 
strative operations of the elaborative faculty. Deny 
them, in the madness of a perverse contradictoriness, or 
demand their proofs in order to their acceptance, and 
there can be no start of the reasoning process : the mind 
becomes a blank, a desert barren of ideas, an engine 
without its motive power. Intellectual stagnation 
results. 

What, then, was the error of the pantheistic and ab- 
solutist philosophers ? It was, first, that they treated 
faith- judgments as though they were concepts. Instead 
of accepting the infinite, and what they called the Abso- 
lute as data of belief, incapable of analysis and com- 
parison, they dealt with them as data of thought, to 
which those processes are applicable. It is obvious that 
a concept of the dianoetic understanding may be 
analyzed into its contents. The stuff of which it is com- 
posed is supplied by perception and representation, nor 
can it transcend that material. It is also obvious that 
one concept may be compared with others, and that it 
is in this way of comparison that the premises of argu- 
ments are framed. Now dealing with the infinite as if it 
were a concept based upon intuition and representation, 
these philosophers made the attempt — impossible to 
even their Titanic powers — to analyze it into its con- 
tents, and to make it a term of comparison in syllogistic 



204 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

processes. Of course, they failed. As well might they 
have endeavored to comprehend the ocean in a thimble 
as to pack the infinite into the narrow capacity of their 
thinking faculty. They made the prodigious mistake 
of substituting the dianoetic for the noetic reason, of 
regarding noumena as phenomena ; in short, of enthron- 
ing conception in the seat of faith. This, in brief, was 
their first great error. 

Their second error was, that they refused to receive 
some of the judgments of faith. Upon the very same 
ground as that upon which we know the infinite, we also 
know cause and personality. Both of these latter ap- 
prehensions are indemonstrable and incomprehensible. 
They are furnished by faith, and are to be accepted on 
the ground of the veracity of our radical nature as 
reflecting the veracity of its Author. There is no justifi- 
cation for receiving the datum of the infinite and refus- 
the data of cause and personality. When, therefore, 
these philosophers separated between them, accepting 
the former and rejecting the latter, they violated our 
mental nature: they tore asunder elements which were 
bound together in the unity of our intellectual consti- 
tution, and trampled under foot some of its fundamental 
postulates. They set the mind against itself in un- 
natural conflict, divided its house, and the necessary 
alternatives were; either that the house should fall, or 
that the revolutionary intruders should be resisted and 
expelled. The latter alternative, as might have been 
expected, has been realized. The erectors of a Babel of 
pride have had their tongues split, and every man's 
hand, by a just retribution, has been lifted against his 



Pantheism. 205 

fellow. One extreme by reaction breeds another, and 
the world now beholds the land of Fichte, Schelling and 
Hegel tending to the crypto-materialisrn of a physio- 
logical psychology ! 

4. This school is open to the criticism of neglecting 
to profit by the example of the Greek philosophers. If 
Cousin is right, idealism and sensualism (better, per- 
haps, empiricism) have ever been the poles of philo- 
sophic thought. In Plato, on the one hand, and Aristotle 
on the other, these two great principles received a defi- 
nite and typical shape, and their respective followers 
more and more widened the interval between the lines 
of their seperate development. The result was a pro- 
tracted conflict between theories both grounded in prin- 
ciples equally belonging to our fundamental constitution, 
and a failure to evince their harmonious and comple- 
mentary operation as corresponding with the unity of 
the human mind. When the freedom of speculation 
was secured by the decay of the dominating influence of 
a false ecclesiastical system, Descartes and Bacon pro- 
jected modern philosophy along the same old tracks of 
idealism and empiricism. Not that the Frenchman was 
exclusively an idealist, or the Englishman exclusively 
an empiricist, but the prominent trend of the former's 
thinking was in the direction of idealism, and the latter 
in that of sensualism. The pantheists and transcenden- 
talists, inexcusably unmindful of the lessons of the past, 
again violated the harmony of philosophy and the unity 
of the mind by giving to their speculations an exclu- 
sive development of idealism. Having launched forth 
in search of the Absolute, without the compass of experi- 



206 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ence, they foundered in an ocean of mists without bottom 
and without shore. 

Furthermore, they were doubly inexcusable for going 
farther than the Greek idealists ever went, in affirming, 
as the last conclusion of philosophy, an absolute some- 
thing, or, with Hegel, nothing, without consciousness or 
personality, and evolving, by the law of immanent neces- 
sity, into the matter and spirit of the universe : a climax 
of folly which the regulated genius of the Greek never 
reached. 

5. It may be added that these philosophers are liable 
to the grave charge of having contemned the modifying 
influence of the Bible and Christianity upon the course 
of modern philosophy. It cannot be successfully denied 
that the Bible, as well as philosophy, utters itself in the 
sphere of ontology. It declares the existence of a per- 
sonal God, who is the creator of the world, and its provi- 
dential preserver and ruler. This testimony is, for its 
own sake, entitled at least to be respectfully considered. 
Contemplated simply from the point of view of its on- 
tology, the Bible justly challenges attention ; but even 
were the boast of philosophy allowed, that it is an alto- 
gether independent inquirer in a field which it claims 
for its own research, and not to be trammelled by reli- 
gion in any form, yet so far as the Bible assumes to 
speak on philosophical questions, as to a certain extent 
it unquestionably does, it is entitled to the same rights. 
When, therefore, philosophy and the Bible meet on the 
same field — a field which both legitimately occupy — and 
announce opposite doctrines, the question of superior 
authority inevitably arises; and it is clear that it can 



Pantheism. 207 

only be decided upon grounds of evidence; and then 
the tremendous mass and force of the evidence which 
supports the authority and the truth of the Bible, which 
differentiates it as well from philosophy, ontologically 
considered, as from every form of extra-biblical revela- 
tion, not only necessitate examination, but demand 
assent. What analogous evidence has mere philosophy 
to submit? None, absolutely none, which the Bible, 
minus its extraordinary credentials, does not possess. 
Add those credentials, and there is no possibility of com- 
parison, for one of the terms to be compared has no 
existence. It would be a comparison of an alleged 
supreme evidence and none. It would be madness to 
say that historical evidence cannot outweigh the abstract 
inferences of the speculative intellect. 

Now the whole volume of evidence, external, internal, 
and experimental, in favor of the Bible and Christi- 
anity these modern sages affect to throw out of account, 
and arrogate to themselves the right to pursue their own 
independent investigations and to reach their own 
separate conclusions. What has been the issue ? This : 
That, as before the first advent to this despairing earth, 
of an incarnate God, philosophy had failed in its utmost 
development, and "the world by wisdom knew not God/' 
so is it now. Modern philosophy, blindly and arrogantly 
refusing to bow to God's supernatural revelation of him- 
self, and insisting upon walking in the light of its own 
sparks, has scaled the summit of speculation, and thence 
proclaims a God unknown in heaven, earth, or hell. 
Again, the verdict must be, that the world by wisdom 
knows not God. Is it not time for the close of this 



208 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

present period of audacious speculation, of profound 
ignorance of divine things, of widespread infidelity, and 
the introduction of that "golden age," when the know- 
ledge of the LORD shall cover the earth as the waters 
cover the sea? 



SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON'S DOCTRINE 
OF CAUSATION. 



Part I. 



IN the consideration of Hamilton's doctrine in regard 
to causation, some comments will first be made upon 
his views concerning the nature of cause itself, and then 
his theory, with reference to the origin of the causal 
judgment, will be examined. 

I. There are two special views in regard to cause, 
which he very much insists upon, and which, if not 
entirely defective, need greater qualification than he 
himself imposes upon them. 

1. He maintains that every effect is the product of 
more than one cause — is the product of concurring 
causes. "Every effect," he declares, "is only produced 
by the concurrence of at least two causes." * Had he 
affirmed that this is ordinarily the case, no valid objec- 
tion could be taken to the position ; but the assertion is 
unqualified : the predication is made of "every effect," 
and it is affirmed that it is "only produced" by a con- 
currence of causes. Nor is the utterance cited at all 
singular, or peculiar to the connection in which it stands. 
It is true that in one place Hamilton does impose a 
qualification upon this general law. "I have already," 

1 Met. Lect., p. 42. 
209 



210 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

he observes, "noticed to you tbe error of philosophers in 
supposing that anything can have a single cause, of 
course, I speak only of second causes. Of the causation 
of the Deity we can form no possible conception. Of 
second causes, I say, there must almost always be at 
least a concurrence of two to constitute an effect." 1 The 
use of the word almost here is noteworthy. It obviously 
limits the scope of the maxim for which he contends. 
Yet, it is strange that the limitation is admitted in im- 
mediate connection with the exposure of the alleged error 
that anything can have a single cause. I know of no 
other instance in which the qualification is employed. 
It is the common doctrine of Hamilton that every effect 
is produced by con-causes. 

(1) The assertion of this law is made in the very 
midst of a discussion, the design of which is to prove that 
the end sought by philosophy is a first cause of effects, 
and the discover of unity in that one, ultimate cause. 
Now if a series of effects begin in a cause which imparts 
unity to the whole, it is perfectly clear that the first 
effect in the series can have but one cause. Ex hypothesi, 
analysis, carried back regressively, conducts us to an 
ultimate cause, and consequently a plurality, or even a 
duality, of causes is excluded. The universal affirma- 
tion of Hamilton, that every effect must have more than 
one cause, is invalidated by his own doctrine touching 
the quest by philosophy of an ultimate cause, as satisfy- 
ing the demand for unity. 

It will, no doubt, be objected that injustice has been 
done to Hamilton by this criticism, since he is only 

1 Met. Led., p. 554. 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 211 

speaking of second causes. To this objection the reply 
is obvious. 

In the first place, the scope of the discussion, in which 
the passage which has been cited as the occasion of these 
remarks occurs, does include, in fact, a reference to the 
efficiency of God as the first cause. Hamilton had not 
long before elaborately argued that one of the most 
useful ends of philosophy is to conduct us to the know- 
ledge of the divine existence and the divine causality. 
The discussion, therefore, cannot simply apply to second 
causes. 

In the second place, the scope of the discussion must, 
from the very nature of the case, involve the causal 
efficiency of God. For what, according to Hamilton, 
does philosophy seek ? He answers, Unity. How is this 
to be attained ? He replies, By an analysis of effects 
into their causes, an analysis to be continued until we 
arrive at the first cause. Now if, as he contends, every 
second cause is itself an effect, which is produced by 
more than one cause, it would follow that, upon his own 
doctrine, philosophy would be doomed to perpetual dis- 
appointment in its search for unity along the line of 
second causes. The nisus is confessed; but it is one, 
like the labor of the Danaides, destined to everlasting 
failure. Its sweat evaporates into nothing. Nature 
would cheat us with an illusive hope; but this effort, 
induced by the fundamental laws of the mind, is an 
inspired prophecy of a definite result. There must be 
some point, in the regression through effects and causes, 
at which the demand, the insatiable thirst, for ultimate 
unity may be satisfied. That last point, that Ultima 



212 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

Thule, of our investigations can, of necessity, only be 
reached when we apprehend one simple, uncompounded 
cause, which, by its sole efficiency, originates the whole 
series of second causes and effects, and therefore stamps 
the series as a system, in itself complex indeed, but 
characterized by the attribute of unity. Hamilton's dis- 
cussions, consequently, cannot be restricted to second 
causes, but must involve the first cause. In this view 
of it, it is liable to the charge of inconsistency. The 
universal affirmation that every effect is only produced 
by concurrent causes needs to be seriously modified. 
Otherwise, it is not true. 

It may also be objected, that Hamilton is not speaking 
merely of efficient causes. His affirmation includes all 
kinds of causes ; for he says : "By cause, be it observed, 
I mean everything without which the effect could not he 
realized." But in answer it may be said, that he ex- 
pressly uses the terms efficient causes. "The ends — the 
final causes of philosophy — as we have seen, are two: 
first, the discovery of efficient causes ; secondly, the gen- 
eralization of our knowledge into unity ; two ends, how- 
ever, which fall together into one, inasmuch as the 
higher we proceed in the discovery of causes, we neces- 
sarily approximate more and more to unity." Here he 
not only limits the view to efficient causes, but declares 
that it is in approaching the ultimate efficient cause we 
approximate to unity. The only kind of causes of 
which, in this relation he speaks, are those which pro- 
duce effects, abundant proof of which might be adduced 
from the language that he constantly employs. In the 
passage just quoted he explicitly discriminates final 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 213 

causes from efficient, the former leading to the discovery 
of the latter. Formal causes Hamilton was too good a 
metaphysician, too thoroughly acquainted with Aristotle, 
to rank with efficient, or to represent them as cooperat- 
ing with efficient in the production of effects. To say 
that material and instrumental causes are co-efficients 
in producing the effect is to say that the marble and the 
chisel produce the statute. The one is but the matter, 
the other the instrument, which the efficient cause, the 
producer, uses. If it be still urged that Hamiltou 
treated material and instrumental causes as efficient, it 
must be said that he used his terms with an inaccuracy 
strange in so precise a thinker, and that he confounded 
producing causes with the conditions upon which they 
operate ; that, in other words, he coordinated occasional 
with efficient causes. It is perfectly manifest that if 
there be a first cause, enforcing unity, it cannot be either 
a material or an instrumental cause, nor can it be one 
combining both; it must be simply an efficient cause. 
This leads to the remark that the reason why so much is 
here made of this question is that, if philosophy conducts 
us, as it certainly does, to God as the First Cause of all 
things, it points out as the goal of its inquiries, not a 
complex, but simply an efficient, cause. He is abso- 
lutely one, not many. Even Mr. Herbert Spencer refers 
every effect to an infinite and eternal energy. 

It may further be objected that Hamilton speaks of 
causes, only so far as they are apprehensible to thought 
— as they are conceivable by the thinking faculty ; and 
that he does not include the data of faith. This objec- 
tion is rendered plausible by the following remarkable 



214 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

passage — remarkable as penned by Sir William Hamil- 
ton: 

" These first causes do not indeed lie within the reach of 
philosophy, nor even within the sphere of our comprehension; nor, 
consequently, on the actual reaching them does the existence of 
philosophy depend. But as philosophy is the knowledge of effects 
in their causes, the tendency of philosophy is ever upwards; and 
philosophy can, in thought, in theory, only be viewed as accom- 
plished — which in reality it never can be — when the ultimate 
causes— the causes on which all other causes depend — have been 
attained and understood." x 

The objection, apparently supported by this passage, 
would be valid were philosophy, like logic, confined to 
the domain of thought; but I have not so understood 
Hamilton in other utterances. Philosophy is not a mere 
registry of concepts. It is vastly more. Passing out- 
side of the facts of psychology — the field of empirical 
knowledge — it peculiarly expatiates in the realm of in- 
ferences. Let us hear Hamilton himself when discours- 
ing of the divisions of philosophy : 

"In the First Branch — the Phenomenology of mind — philos- 
ophy is properly limited to the facts afforded in consciousness, 
considered exclusively in themselves. But these facts may be such 
as not only to be objects of knowledge in themselves, but likewise 
to furnish us with grounds of inference to something out of them- 
selves. . . . Although, therefore, existence be only revealed to 
us in phenomena, and though we can, therefore, have only a rela- 
tive knowledge either of mind or of matter ; still by inference and 
analogy, we may legitimately attempt to rise above the mere 
appearances which experience and observation afford. Thus, for 
example, the existence of God and the Immortality of the Soul are 
not given us as phenomena, as objects of immediate knowledge; 
yet, if the phenomena actually given do necessarily require, for 
their rational explanation, the hypotheses of immortality and of 

1 Met. Led., p. 41. 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 215 

God, we are assuredly entitled, from the existence of the former, 
to infer the reality of the latter. Now, the science conversant 
about all such inferences of unknown being [i. e., not immediately 
known] from its known [immediately known] manifestations, is 
called Ontology, or Metaphysics Peoper. We might call it 
Inferential Psychology." * 

This is wisely and truly spoken ; and, if so, one fails 
to see why, from the phenomenal effects of the universe, 
we are not entitled to infer a First Cause. The only 
question is, whether such inference is knowledge. It 
would be trivial to say that it cannot be knowledge be- 
cause it is not immediate knowledge; that is, that 
involved in consciousness — that a species cannot be 
included under a genus, because it is not another species ! 
It is, indeed, mediate knowledge, but its mediateness 
in no degree derogates from either its reality or its im- 
portance. Of what real and ultimate advantage would 
be our immediate knowledge of mere phenomena, did 
it not condition the higher, the eternal knowledge of our 
souls, of immortality, of God ? What folly it would be 
to dignify the perception of the "vesture," "incompar- 
able," though it be, in which the Deity condescends to 
array himself, with the name of knowledge, and to deny 
that appellation to the apprehension of the Deity him- 
self ! The First Cause is none the less known because 
he cannot be thought — cannot be conceived and compre- 
hended ; and the same, although in a far lower degree, 
is true of finite cause. ~No cause is thought; it is be- 
lieved. Thought furnishes its phenomenal manifesta- 
tions, and faith, proceeding upon these thought- 
conditions, affirms cause itself. 

1 Met. Led., p. 88. 



216 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

(2) The sweeping affirmation that every effect is the 
product of more than one cause meets another limitation 
in the causal efficiency of the human soul. Here the 
question is disembarrassed of relation to the "hyper- 
physical" causality of God, at least as immediately 
exercised. Hamilton speaks of "first causes/' as among 
the ends sought by philosophy in its endeavor to attain 
to unity. These first causes are, of course, viewed by 
him as specific, derived, relative, not as generic, original, 
absolute. This determination is admitted. JSTow, upon 
this assumption, the human soul must be assigned a 
place among these first causes; and as it is confessed 
to be one and indivisible, it must be regarded as being, 
in relation to its own activities, a single and not a con- 
current cause. 

Let us think, away from the question before us, the 
concursus of the Deity with the operations of the soul. 
That, contemplated in a certain sense, is granted; but 
the fact is now left out of account. The problem is con- 
cerned about the causal activities of the soul, considered 
apart from the agency of God. Let us also purge the 
question in hand of all reference to social effort. That, 
it is needless -to say, involves a concurrence of causes, 
the cooperation of soul with soul in the production of 
joint results; but the inquiry is now restricted to the 
relation of an individual soul to its own separate acts. 

Hamilton, his whole school, and all sober thinkers, 
admit that the soul is a substance, and that, as such, it is 
characterized by simplicity. Now is it denied or con- 
ceded that it is also a cause? If denied, one — to com- 
pare Mantua with Borne — is compelled to adopt a view 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 217 

of the soul akin to that which the pantheist holds in 
regard to God. The latter contends that the universe, 
with all its phenomenal facts and occult forces, is an 
emanation from one primordial substance, which he, by 
a tremendous solecism, calls God. Hence the name, 
pantheist. The latter would maintain that all the activi- 
ties, all the phenomenal acts, of the soul are but a sponta- 
neous evolution from its substance. He would, there- 
fore, be fairly entitled to the appropriate name of pan- 
psychist. To the one, God is all, and all is God ; to the 
other, the soul is all, and all is the soul, within the sphere 
in which it manifests itself. The faculties of cognition, 
the feelings and the will may be admitted to be powers 
inherent in and qualifying the soul as it is a substance; 
but actual thoughts, feelings, volitions, are products 
which are caused by the soul operating through those 
powers. There is, however, no need now to argue this 
question. The hypothesis, that the soul is simply a 
substance and not a cause, would have been scouted by 
the great Libertarian who zealously contended that the 
soul is the free, undetermined cause of its own acts, and 
in that fact grounded its responsibility, indeed the very 
possibility of a moral government. The argument is 
ad hominem. 

If, on the other hand, it be conceded that the soul is 
a cause as well as a substance, it must also be granted 
that the regression, by analysis through its subjective 
effects and minor causes, conducts us to the soul itself, 
as relatively the ultimate cause of the series ; but, as it 
is confessed that it is one and indivisible, it must be so, 
both as a cause and a substance ; and we are constrained 



218 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

to allow that, in this instance, there are effects which 
are not the products of concurrent causes. 

Hamilton could not, in answer to this, have resorted 
to the necessitarian view, that the outward circum- 
stances to which the soul is related — its external environ- 
ment — determine its causal activity. He was no neces- 
sitarian. Nor did he maintain, but expressly argued 
against, the supposition that the causal efficiency of the 
soul is determined by a subjective spontaneity in the 
determination of which it had no agency. This is but 
another phase of the necessitarian hypothesis. In this 
he was clearly right, so far forth as man in the condition 
in which he was created is concerned ; and even one, 
who holds that the first free decision of the soul for evil, 
determined ever afterwards, without supernatural, 
divine interposition, its moral spontaneity in the direc- 
tion of evil, maintains that it is responsible for the acts 
which it causally produces in conformity with that 
spontaneous condition. 

If, in rebuttal, it be urged that the motives which 
lead to every act are complex, and that we have not 
escaped from the necessity of supposing a concurrence 
of causes for .every effect, the rejoinder is threefold. 
First, it is denied that motives are efficient causes. Sec- 
ondly, if the motives are conceived as not caused by the 
soul, but as springing from it simply as a substance, it 
is conceded that they have a single ground of existence 
in the substance of the soul which is a unit. Thirdly, 
the motives which spontaneously arise from the very 
make of the soul must by its elective action, through 
the will, be appropriated ere they become the proximate 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 219 

inducements to determinate acts. However many and 
complex the motives may be which, conduce to volition, 
it is, after all, the one, indivisible soul itself which must 
be regarded as the ultimate cause of its acts. But if this 
be so, we have the operation of a single efficient cause 
in the production of effects. 

The same kind of argument, mutatis mutandis, may, 
for aught I know to the contrary, be employed in regard 
to the elementary forces of nature. What proof, for 
instance, is there of a concurrence of causes in the at- 
traction of gravity ? It operates in a vacuum. When 
lightning kills a man, what causes concur with it ? To 
say that there must be a concurrence of a negative and 
positive-electric state is to confound receptivity with 
activity, and mere conditions with efficient causes. 

(3) If Hamilton's doctrine be true, it would follow 
that, in the regression from effects to causes, instead of 
approximating unity more and more, we would be more 
and more multiplying particulars, and increasing diver- 
sity. Starting with a given effect we would have at 
least two causes. Viewing them in turn as effects, 
analysis would give us two causes for each of them, 
making four. For each of these four considered as 
effects we would have two which would yield eight. We 
would increase the number of particular causes at every 
step. The subjoined table will illustrate what is meant : 




220 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

But take the contrary view, and we first encounter 
relative and subordinate first causes, which are single, 
and we refer them to one ultimate and supreme cause, 
thus : 







GOD. 

The conscious activities of each human soul must, for 
example, be assigned to that single soul as their relative 
first cause. What is true of one is true of all; but all 
these souls as subordinate first causes, characterized by 
unity, must be attributed as effects to the causal effi- 
ciency of God. 

2. The second special hypothesis of Hamilton, in 
regard to the nature of cause, to which attention is now 
asked, cannot be more clearly expressed than in his own 
language. He says : 

"We have .seen that causes (taking that term as 
synonymous for all without which the effect would not 
be) are only the co-efficients of the effect ; an effect being 
nothing more than the sum or complement of all the 
partial causes, the concurrence of which constitutes its 
existence." 1 

The same view is propounded in connection with his 
theory of the conditioned in its application to cause. It 

1 Met. Led., p. 68. 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 221 

is, in fact, the office which it is summoned to discharge, 
in that relation which attaches to it its chief significance, 
and on account of which its validity is now challenged. 
The view, as stated by Hamilton in an unqualified form, 
is exposed to serious objections. 

(1) It does not appear that, in every case, all the 
reputed co-efficients of an effect enter into its very con- 
stitution. Take his instance of a neutral salt. He 
mentions three con-causes of its production : an acid, an 
alkali, and a translating force, say, the human hand. 
Granted that the two former enter into the composition 
of the salt, and go to constitute it, what becomes of the 
translating force ? Does either the hand itself as a col- 
lection of nerves, muscles and bones, or the force exerted 
by the hand, enter into the salt ? Surely neither of them 
is one of its constituents. Here, then, we encounter an 
obvious limitation. 

There are effects in relation to which it is impossible 
that Hamilton's law should hold good. A man, for in- 
stance, is killed by a pistol-shot. Here the effect is 
death. How can it, in any sense, be considered as the 
sum or complement of the causes which produced it ? 
Is death a compound of the homicide's volition, the 
weapon, the pulling of a trigger, the explosion of powder, 
the propulsion of a ball, and its penetration into the 
body ? Should it be said that the power of the man who 
fired the shot, acting through these conditions, passes 
into act in the effect, death, a contradiction is asserted ; 
for death is the negation of life, and how a positive 
living power enters into it and constitutes it is impos- 
sible to see. The fact is that Hamilton's law seems to 



222 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

exclude the whole class of events as contradistinguished 
to substances and qualities. 

There are, indeed, effects into which the cause does 
not enter at all as a constituent. The cause ceases to act 
upon the occurrence of the effect, and, in the particular 
relation in which it has acted, ceases to exist. It ex- 
pires, quoad hoc, in the transition. It does not pass over 
into the effect. The illustration just given of death "by 
a pistol-shot is in point. Not one of the so-called con- 
current causes enters into the effect as a constituent of it. 
They all expire in the transition. To this it may be 
replied that the argument from the transitoriness of the 
causes is vain, since there are instances in which the 
effects themselves are but instantaneous and evanescent ; 
but the rejoinder is that the argument based upon the 
expiration of the causes in the moment of production 
has been employed with reference to effects which con- 
tinue after the causes have vanished. Death, as an 
effect, continues after the pistol-shot has ceased. It was 
enough for the purpose in view — namely, the disproof 
of Hamilton's universal affirmation, to adduce some in- 
stances in which it does not hold. Another sort of argu- 
ment, however, was also used — namely, that from the 
nature of the case: it cannot be true that causes always 
enter as constituents into the effect. The supposition is 
absurd. It is in accordance with that argument that this 
particular objection is to be met, From the equal transi- 
toriness of the causes and the effect produced by them 
nothing is gained in favor of the law that causes enter 
into and constitute the effect. Take, an example fur- 
nished by the illustration already employed. The sound 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 223 

of a pistol-shot is a transitory event, it immediately 
expires; but it would be absurd to suppose that the 
homicide's volition, the pointing of the weapon, the 
pulling of the trigger, the impact of the hammer upon 
the cap, and the explosion of the powder entered as con- 
stituents into that sound as one of the effects. For 
aught that appears to the contrary, the same is true of 
those mental and moral acts which are instantaneous, 
which expire at their occurrence. 

(2) The law in question meets another and a decided 
limitation in the case of the divine causality in relation 
to human acts ; unless we assume the principle of the 
pantheist, and merge all effects into the First Cause, 
simply as modifications of the original substance, on 
which supposition we abandon the theory of free causa- 
tion. Blind necessity would rule all relations. But if 
we admit that the divine Being is a free cause, it may be 
asked how he, as cause, or his acts as causes, can be ap- 
prehended as passing into effects and becoming a part 
of their composition. If, for example, God's power 
enters as an element into my power, which, by a creative 
act, it has caused, the unmixed responsibility of which 
I am conscious for my free moral acts is not a fact, 
unless it can be shown that a thing can act independently 
of another thing, which, ex hypothesis is part of itself. 
This consideration is damaging to Hamilton, inasmuch 
as he was a staunch assertor of the pure freedom of the 
will as grounding moral obligation. 

If, again, it be urged that Hamilton speaks only of the 
positive concept of cause, and, therefore, not of the crea- 
tive causality of God, as originating existence, which 



224 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

though he believes he pronounces to be inconceivable; 
it is replied that, upon the supposition of the validity 
of the law that every effect is the sum and complement 
of the causes that produce it, the power of our wills 
must be believed to be caused by an act of God's power, 
and as we are conscious of exercising our power in will- 
ing we must be conscious of exercising that which it 
embraces as an element, which goes to constitute it, viz., 
God's power, and surely we are able to form a concept 
of that of which we are conscious ; and so we must be 
conscious of the effect, within us, of the divine causality, 
and would be able to form a corresponding concept of 
the exercise of our own causality as embracing that of 
God ; which would destroy Hamilton's favorite doctrine 
of the pure freedom of the will as conditioning respon- 
sibility. That is, to be explicit, we would be conscious 
of exercising a power into which God's power enters as 
an integer, and, therefore, could not be conscious of 
exercising only our own power. The consequence would 
be that we are not wholly responsible for the acts of our 
wills. But consciousness, according to Hamilton's con- 
tention, and to truth as well, does testify that we are. 
His doctrine. in regard to consciousness is inconsistent 
with his view of the complementary nature of effects. 

As has been already intimated, the chief interest 
attaching to the questions which have been discussed lies 
in their bearing upon the all-important subject of the 
creative causality of God. If we apply to that subject 
the law that every effect is produced by a concurrence of 
causes, we must suppose that in the act of creation, 
strictly speaking — creation in the first instance — there 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 225 

was a concurrence of causes in the production of the 
effect. But the supposition of a concurrence of strictly 
efficient causes must be ruled out since, manifestly, God 
alone is the efficient cause. The cooperation with his 
efficiency of any other cause in the creative act would 
involve the absurdity of the concurrence of the finite 
with the infinite in accomplishing what only the infinite 
can achieve ; for none but an infinite power could create, 
and as there cannot be two infinite beings, since they 
would limit and condition each other, which is contrary 
to the supposition of infinity, any other cause of creation 
than God himself must needs have been finite. 

But let this be granted, and the ground may still be 
taken that the unity — the absolute singularity — of the 
Deity as creator does not conflict with the supposition 
that the concurrence of divine causes, causes existing 
only in himself, was necessary to the production of the 
created effect. ]N"ow, what causes ? The material cause 
is excluded by the nature of the creative act, considered 
strictly. There was, ex hypothesis no material antece- 
dently to creation out of which the effect could be pro- 
duced. Creation itself produces all materials. Hamil- 
ton, if he is not misunderstood, would have denied this, 
inasmuch as he held that creation is but the actualization 
of the virtual power of God. According to that view 
the divine power, considered virtualiter, was that out of 
which the universe was produced. In this sense, a ma- 
terial cause concurred with the efficient in the creative 
act. This doctrine, to my mind, logically leads to pan- 
theism. All things were created by the power of God, 
not out of it. They are in him, but they are not He. 



226 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

This view does not compromise the doctrine of God's 
immensity and omnitude. He is not displaced by either 
matter or spirit. We cannot believe that space is dis- 
placed by either. Shall we say, then, that all things 
were produced from or out of space, as a material used 
by the creative cause ? The sum of God's being is not 
increased by creation, but it is another thing to say that 
the sum of all other being than he is not increased by it. 
To say that it is not, because what is created and appears 
to begin, was really contained in God's power, virtually 
existed before it actually became phenomenal, is to con- 
found the material cause with the efficient. It is pre- 
cisely God's power which is the efficient cause in crea- 
tion ; power is the very essence of efficient cause. The 
affirmation that the divine power, exercised in creation, 
is, at one and the same time, both efficient and material 
cause, is a contradiction in terms. 

An instrumental cause as concurring in the creative 
act must also be ruled out. The very apprehension of 
creation proper is that it is immediate ; that is, exclusive 
of a medium. An instrumental cause is one through 
which anything is produced. It is the means of produc- 
tion. It is -idle to discuss the question whether, outside 
of God himself, there could have been such a cause. 
Before creation, there was nothing extraneous to God, 
nothing but God himself. As to the question whether 
there was in the divine being itself an instrumental 
cause through which the efficient cause operated, it is 
enough to ask that such a cause be indicated. Until that 
is done, the question is non-existent. 

But what of the formal and the final cause ? Is it not 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 227 

necessary to suppose that even the divine causality was 
exercised in accordance with a concept of the form of 
things to be created, and of the end to be subserved by 
them ? Let it be borne in mind that the question is in 
regard to the efficient production of effects. The dis- 
tinction must not be overlooked, between what was neces- 
sary in their production, and what was necessary to their 
production. There is plausibility in the view that the 
material and the instrumental cause concur in the pro- 
duction of an effect. It may be contended that they are, 
in a sense, producing ; but who would dream of affirming 
the same of the formal and the final cause ? The truth is, 
that neither the material nor the instrumental cause is 
a part of the power which produces. They are both the 
products of power — of the divine power, for it is that 
which is under consideration. This difficulty can only 
be avoided by regarding those causes as intrinsic to the 
divine power itself — as forming, so to speak, a part of 
its contents, a position which has already, to some extent, 
been criticised. 

As to formal and final causes, we may adopt one or the 
other of two theories. We may, with some of the school- 
men and the modern objective idealist (in part), hold 
that God's knowledge is identical with his power, his 
intelligence with his will. Upon that supposition, the 
concurrence of formal and final causes with efficient in 
the divine causality is out of the question, for, accord- 
ing to the theory, they are one and the same. If intelli- 
gence be the power that creates, it is very certain that 
intelligence cannot cooperate with power, unless a thing 
can cooperate with itself. 



228 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

But if we adopt the view that God's intelligence and 
will are not identical, then, first, we reject the theory 
that his intelligence causes the universe just as it causes 
its own thoughts, that the universe is the "objectified 
thought" of God ; whatever that remarkable phraseology 
may mean. Secondly, we must hold that the determina- 
tions of the divine will are not arbitrary, but, to speak 
reverently, directed by the divine intelligence. At the 
same time we must also believe that the divine will is 
the seat of causal efficiency. Its determinations and 
exercise accord with infinite wisdom, but it is not 
wisdom, it is the power of the will, which is causally 
efficient. Wisdom is a sine qua non of creation, but it 
is not wisdom, it is power that creates. Intelligence is 
in order to the creative act; it is not a co-efficient in- 
producing it. It is power that produces. If, therefore, 
we seek unity by regression along the line of causes — 
and Hamilton tells us that it is along that line we must 
seek it — we are conducted through all subordinate 
causes, however characterized by relative unity, ulti- 
mately to the will of God, the primal fountain of power, 
the efficient cause of the universe of being. Thus far in 
regard to the unqualified dictum: every effect is pro- 
duced by a concurrence of causes, in its application to 
the divine causality — an application with which we are 
authorized to deal, not by the concepts of the thinking 
faculty, which are incompetent to apprehend the In- 
finite, but by the judgments of the believing faculty, 
about which philosophy and religion are alike con- 
cerned. The question is a difficult one, and opens up 
measureless expanses to investigation, but no more in 
relation to it can here be said. 



Hamilton's Docteine of Causation. 229 

Concerning the application to the divine causality of 
the other dictum: every effect is the sum and comple- 
ment of its causes, but little need be added. Such an 
application would seem to be impossible. It cannot be 
true that the intelligence and power of God — even if 
they be viewed as con-causes — enter into and constitute 
finite effects. If God be immaterial he cannot become 
a part of the material system ; if he be infinite he can- 
not become a part of the finite. To say that he is not a 
part of them, he is the material and the finite, is to fra- 
ternize with the pantheist. 

I cannot close this part of the discussion without 
repeating the conviction already expressed in the course 
of these discussions. It is that the First Cause is not, 
as such, the ultimate principle of unity. That principle 
is the First Substance as Fundamental Being, who, in 
the exercise of the attribute of infinite power, is the 
personal cause of all being but his own. The ultimate 
answer to that " qustioning impulse " that ever asks, 
Why ? can only be reached when we apprehend by faith 
the divine essence itself, uncaused, necessary, self- 
existent, of which the divine causality is but the omnipo- 
tent energy. The infinite, personal substance is the 
absolute goal of all inquiry. Itself incomprehensible, it 
is the explanation as it is the free origin of the universe. 
Here philosophy and religion together rest: here they 
kneel together and render their united worship. 



230 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 



Part II. 

I PROCEED now to examine Hamilton's doctrine in 
regard to the origin of the causal judgment. 

Let us hear him state, for the most part, in his own 
language, his position, in the first place, in regard to the 
theory of the conditioned, and, in the second place, con- 
cerning the application of that theory to the origin of 
the causal judgment. 

What is the conditioned ? What the unconditioned ? 
He answers: "The conditioned is that which is alone 
conceivable or cogitable ; the unconditioned, that which 
is inconceivable or incogitable." x 

The unconditioned, as generic, he distributes into two 
specific aspects as "repugnant opposites." "The one is 
that of unconditional or absolute limitation; the other 
that of unconditional or infinite illimitation. The one 
we may, therefore, in general call the absolutely uncon- 
ditioned, the other the infinitely unconditioned; or, 
more simply, the absolute and the infinite ; the term 
absolute expressing that which is finished or complete, 
the term infinite that which cannot be terminated or 
concluded." 2 

He thus, in general terms, states what he denomi- 
nates the law of the conditioned : "The law of mind, that 
the conceivable is in every relation bounded by the 
inconceivable, I call the law of the conditioned." 3 
Again he says, more particularly : "The conceivable lies 

l Met. Led., p. 530. 2 Ibid., p. 530. 8 Ibid. 



Hamilton's Docteine of Causation". 231 

always between two inconceivable extremes." 1 "I lay 
it down as a law which, though not generalized by 
philosophers, can be easily proved to be true by its appli- 
cation to the phenomena : that all that is conceivable in 
thought lies between two [inconceivable] extremes, 
which, as contradictory of each other, cannot both be 
true, but of which, as mutual contradictories, one [upon 
the principle of excluded middle] must." 2 The words 
in brackets are elsewhere employed by himself. What 
he here speaks of as conceivable in thought he in other 
places terms "positive thought." 

Having collected from himself his theory of the con- 
ditioned, let us attend to his application of that theory 
to "the causal judgment." 

It would be superfluous to quote Hamilton in proof 
of his rejection of the hypothesis that the notion of 
cause is simply that of invariable antecedence and 
sequence. He fully admits the productive character of 
causes in relation to phenomenal changes. Cause is, in 
a word, efficient. Hence the legitimacy of the term 
effect — a term abusively employed by the advocates of 
the hypothesis of antecedence and sequence. 

He explicitly concedes the necessity of the causal 
judgment. "It is plain," he remarks, "that the observa- 
tion, that certain phenomena are found to succeed cer- 
tain other phenomena, and the generalization consequent 
thereon, that these are reciprocally causes and effects, 
could never of itself have engendered not only the 
strong, but the irresistible belief, that every event must 
have a cause." 3 "We have here to account not only for 

1 Met. Led., p. 528. 2 Ibid., p. 527. * Ibid., p. 544. 



232 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

a strong, but for an absolutely irresistible, belief." * 
"Do we find that the causal judgment is weaker in the 
young, stronger in the old ? There is no difference. In 
either case there is no less and no more ; the necessity in 
both is absolute." 2 It is enough, upon this point, to 
add that, in the table of theories he has furnished, he 
formally includes his own theory under the general class 
of a 'priori principles. 3 

But he distributes a priori necessity into two kinds — 
negative and positive. 

" It is agreed," he observes, "that the quality of necessity is 
that which discriminates a native from an adventitious element of 
knowledge. When we find, therefore, a cognition which contains 
this discriminative quality, we are entitled to lay it down as one 
which could not have been obtained as a generalization from expe- 
rience. This I admit. But when philosophers lay it down not 
only as native to the mind, but as a positive and immediate datum 
of an [?] intellectual power, I demur. It is evident that the 
quality of necessity in a cognition may depend on two different 
and opposite principles, inasmuch as it may either be the result 
of a power, or of a powerlessness, of the thinking principle. In 
the one case, it will be a Positive, in the other a Negative, neces- 
sity." 4 

On the one hand, he attributes to a positive necessity 
the origin of ."the notion of existence and its modifica- 
tions, the principles of identity, and contradiction, and 
excluded middle, the intuitions of space and time, 
etc." 5 

On the other hand, he ascribes to a negative necessity 
the origin of the notion "of cause and effect, and of sub- 
stance and phenomenon or accident. Both are only 

l Met. Led., p. 545. * Ibid., p. 545. * Ibid., p. 540. 
*Ibid., p. 525. *Ibid., p. 525. 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 233 

applications of the principle of the conditioned, in dif- 
ferent relations." * 

Although the principle of causality is assigned by 
Hamilton to the class of pure or a priori conditions of 
intelligence, he holds that it is not original, but derived ; 
not original, in the sense of a primary, affirmative 
datum, a special, positive principle which is a revelation 
of intelligence, but derived, in the sense that it is neces- 
sitated by and conditioned upon a mental inability, a 
mental impotence. "The eighth and last opinion [that 
held by himself among the eight enumerated] is that 
which regards the judgment of causality as derived ; and 
derives it not from a power, but from an impotence, of 
mind; in a word, from the principle of the condi- 
tioned." 2 It is not, however, derived from experience : 
"The causal principle is considered not as a result, but 
as a condition, of experience." 3 That is, if I under- 
stand Hamilton, it is not originated by experience, but 
by a native inability of the mind which antedates and 
conditions experience. 

What is the causal judgment ? Hamilton says : 

" When we are aware of something which begins to be, we are, 
by the necessity of our intelligence, constrained to believe that it 
has a Cause. But what does the expression that it has a cause 
signify? If we analyze our thought, we shall find that it simply 
means, that as we cannot conceive any new existence to commence, 
therefore, all that now is seen to arise under a new appearance 
had previously an existence under a prior form. We are utterly 
unable to realize in thought the possibility of the complement of 
existence being either increased or diminished." * 

Elsewhere more briefly : 

x Met. Led., p. 532. 2 Ibid., p. 547. * Ibid., p. 538. 
4 Ibid., p. 532. 



234 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

" It is the inability we experience of annihilating in thought 
an existence in time past, in other words, our utter impotence of 
conceiving its absolute commencement, that constitutes and ex- 
plains the whole phenomenon of causality." * 

Again : 

" To say that a thing previously existed under different forms, 
is only, in other words, to say, that a thing had causes." 2 

What, now, is the bearing of the theory of the condi- 
tioned upon the causal judgment. To cite all the pas- 
sages which are necessary to furnish a full answer to 
this question would be tiresome. The sum is this : The 
law that all positive thought (or conception) lies between 
two inconceivable and contradictory extremes, one of 
which, upon the principle of excluded middle, must be 
true, controls the specific positive thought (of concept) 
of cause. It, therefore, lies between two inconceivable 
and contradictory extremes. They are, on the one hand, 
an absolute commencement, and, on the other, an infinite 
series of relative commencements. As we are impotent 
to think an absolute commencement, we are compelled to 
think that what begins to be had a previous existence in 
another form, or other forms ; that is, that its present 
form is but the effect of its previous form or forms. 
Such is the genesis of the causal judgment. 

But betwixt the two contradictory extremes between 
which that positive thought of cause lies, we are com- 
pelled to choose one as true, and reject the other as 
false. The extreme of an absolute commencement is 
proved to be the true alternative by a deliverance of 
consciousness, either direct or indirect. How ? In this 

1 Met. Led., p. 554. 2 Ibid., p. 554. 



Hamilton's Docteine of Causation. 235 

way : In every free act of the will, of which we are con- 
scious, we are conscious, directly or indirectly, of an 
absolute commencement. As the authority of conscious- 
ness is ultimate, we must accept its testimony to the fact, 
although inconceivable. 

This last point is important, and it will be confirmed 
by quotations from Hamilton : 

" If," says he, "the causal judgment be not an express affirma- 
tion of mind, but only an incapacity to think the opposite; it 
follows, that such a negative judgment cannot counterbalance the 
express affirmative, the unconditional testimony of consciousness — 
that we are, though we know not how, the true and responsible 
authors of our actions, nor [not?] merely the worthless links in 
an adamantine series of effects and causes." x 

The same view is elsewhere presented with only some 
variation in the language : 

" If the causal judgment be not an affirmation of mind, but 
merely an incapacity of positively thinking the contrary, it fol- 
lows that such a negative judgment cannot stand in opposition to 
the positive consciousness — the affirmative deliverance that we 
are truly the authors — the responsible originators, of our actions, 
and not merely links in the adamantine series of effects and 
causes." 2 

" In favor of our moral nature, the fact that we are free is 
given us in the consciousness of an uncompromising law of Duty, 
in the consciousness of our moral accountability." 3 

"How, therefore, I repeat, moral liberty is possible in man or 
God, we are utterly unable speculatively to understand. But 
practically, the fact, that we are free, is given to us in the con- 
sciousness of an uncompromising law of duty, in the consciousness 
of our moral accountability." i 

" There is no conceivable medium between Fatalism and Casu- 
alism; and the contradictory schemes of Liberty and Necessity are 

1 Discussions, p. 596. * Met. Lect., p. 557. 3 Ibid., p. 558. 

4 Disc, p. 597. 



236 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

themselves inconceivable. For, as we cannot compass in thought 
an undetermined cause — an absolute commencement — the funda- 
mental hypothesis of the one; so we can as little think an infinite 
series of determined causes — of relative commencements — the fun- 
damental hypothesis of the other. The champions of the opposite 
doctrines are thus at once resistless in assault, and impotent in 
defence. 1 Each is hewn down, and appears to die under the home- 
thrusts of his adversary; but each again recovers life from the 
very death of his antagonist, and, to borrow a simile, both are 
like the heroes in Valhalla, ready in a moment to amuse them- 
selves anew in the same bloodless and interminable conflict. The 
doctrine of Moral Liberty cannot be made conceivable, for we can 
only conceive the determined and the relative. As already stated, 
all that can be done is to shew — 1», That for the fact of Liberty 
we have, immediately or mediately, the evidence of consciousness; 
and, 2o, That there are, among the phenomena of mind, many facts 
which we must admit as actual, but of whose possibility we are 
wholly unable to form any notion/' 2 

" If our intellectual nature be not a lie — if our consciousness 
and conscience do not deceive us in the immediate datum of an 
Absolute Law of Duty (to say nothing of an immediate datum of 
Liberty itself) — we are free, as we are moral agents." 3 

Another passage is cited, for the reason that it ap- 
pears to throw some light upon the end which Hamilton 
contemplated in this remarkable speculation. 

" We admit," he tells us, "that the consequence of this doctrine 
is — that philosophy, if viewed as more than a science of the Condi- 
tioned — is impossible. Departing from the particular, we admit 
that we can never, in our highest generalizations, rise above the 
Finite; that our knowledge, whether of mind or matter, can be 
nothing more than a knowledge of the relative manifestations of 
an existence, which, in itself, it is our highest wisdom to recognize 

1 Gladium, non scutum, habent. 

2 Hamilton's Reid, p. 602, note. The illustration might have 
been omitted from the quotation as not necessary to the point in 
view; but it is inserted on account of its great beauty. Kant 
gives it in substance. 

8 Ibid., p. 624. 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 237 

as beyond the reach of philosophy; in the language of St. Austin, 
'Cognoscendo ignorari, et ignorando cognosci.' " x 

Yet, in the very midst of this discussion, Hamilton is 
constrained to admit a source of knowledge which 
transcends the compass of thought. 

"By a wonderful revelation," says he, "we are thus, in the very 
consciousness of our inability to conceive aught above the relative 
and finite, inspired with a belief in the existence of something 
unconditioned beyond the sphere of all comprehensible reality." 

Hamilton's position having been stated, for the most 
part in his own words, the way is open for a considera- 
tion of its merits. Before, however, the grounds of 
dissent are submitted, it is proper that the points of 
concurrence should be distinctly indicated. I admit — 

First, That Hamilton is right in maintaining that the 
relation between what are termed causes and effects is 
not that of mere antecedence and sequence, even though 
invariable, but that it is a relation supposing productive- 
ness. The thing which begins to be not only follows 
another thing denominated its cause, but is produced 
by it — that is, it is really an effect, not simply a sequent. 

Secondly, That Hamilton's theory of the conditioned 
is correct, so far forth as it holds that the thinking 
faculty is bounded on all sides by the unthinkable, that 
the power of conception is in every direction limited by 
the inconceivable ; in a word, that thought cannot appre- 
hend, much less comprehend, the absolute and infinite ; 
that the power to apprehend that which transcends 
thought, to rise to the infinite and affirm it as a datum 

1 Discussions, p. 14. 



238 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

of intelligence, belongs to belief or f aitb. In tbis respect 
be bas enounced a master-distinction, wbicb is suited to 
unravel some of tbe profoundest difficulties alike of 
philosophy and of religion. 

Thirdly, That tbere are at tbe root of our mental con- 
stitution certain native principles, fundamental laws of 
thought and belief, necessities of thinking and believing ; 
that these laws are at first implicit and beneath con- 
sciousness; that, while they are not dependent for ex- 
istence upon any conditions of experience, they are 
dependent for formal expression upon the empirical 
conditions furnished by perception, representation and 
conception; that, when thus elicited from latency and 
developed into definite shape, they become great judg- 
ments, standards, criteria, in accordance with which 
the processes of thought and faith are enforced and 
regulated. Here there is, in this discussion, not only no 
dispute, but full and cordial agreement, with Hamilton's 
views, views in which he concurred with the ablest and 
soundest thinkers of ancient and modern times. 1 

Fourthly, That the causal judgment is characterized 
by necessity. It is not contingent; we must form it. 
But assenting to Hamilton's doctrine of its necessity, I 
am compelled to differ with him in regard to the specific 
character of this necessity. He maintains that it is 
negative. On the contrary, the true view would seem 
to be, that it is positive. This touches a vital point in 
Hamilton's theory, and it will be more particularly con- 
sidered as the discussion advances. 

1 See Hamilton's Supplementary Dissertations to his edition 
of Reid: Note A, On the Philosophy of Common Sense, p. 770. 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 239 

With these admissions, I pass on to state certain 
reasons which oppose the acceptance of Hamilton's 
special theory in relation to cause. 

1. His position, that we are bound, by an immediate 
or a mediate datum of consciousness, to accept the fact 
of an absolute commencement, may, upon his own prin- 
ciples, be proved untenable. 

In applying "the law of the conditioned" to the sub- 
ject of cause, he holds that the "causal judgment" lies 
between the inconceivable and contradictory extremes 
of an absolute commencement and an infinite series of 
relative commencements. Of these, upon the principle 
of excluded middle, one must be true. The alternative 
which, in this case, we must elect as true is that of an 
absolute commencement. Why 1 Because it is certified 
to us, immediately or mediately, by consciousness. It 
is the evidence of consciousness, and that alone, which 
he pleads in support of the alleged fact. 

What is an absolute commencement? It is, says 
Hamilton, "a cause which is not itself an effect." It is 
that which begins to be without any cause for its exist- 
ence^ — a beginning without a beginner. This we are 
utterly unable to think, to conceive, for we are unable 
not to think that everything which begins had a previous 
existence in another form. The sum of existence 
cannot be increased. We are, therefore, obliged to 
refund every apparently new existence into the old 
complement of existence, to which no> addition can be 
made. 

But the fact of an absolute commencement, thus 
inconceivable, is delivered to us, immediately or me- 



240 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

diately, by consciousness, the testimony of which cannot 
be resisted. 

Now, argues Hamilton, the alleged existence of a 
special, original principle, or law, which necessitates the 
positive affirmation, that everything which begins to be 
must have had a cause, is contradicted by the deliverance 
of consciousness to the fact of an absolute commence- 
ment. Hence he concludes that the causal judgment is 
the result, not of a power of mind, but of a mental impo- 
tence. 

In what way is this testimony given us ? How does 
consciousness deliver to us the fact of an absolute com- 
mencement ? In every free moral act of the will. Every 
such act must be either determined or undetermined. If 
determined, it is not free, but necessary. If unde- 
termined, it is not necessary, but free. Now we are 
conscious that in every moral act of the will, we are not 
determined to it, we are free in its performance. We 
have "the positive consciousness — the affirmative deliv- 
erance that we are truly the authors — the responsible 
originators, of our actions. " Every free moral act 
being an absolute commencement, in being conscious of 
the former, we have the proof of the latter. The testi- 
mony of consciousness, let it be observed, is the only 
proof which Hamilton adduces in favor of an absolute 
commencement. It is, therefore, evident that the ques- 
tion turns upon the fact of such testimony: Does con- 
sciousness furnish it? As Hamilton states, that this 
testimony is given immediately or mediately, it will be 
necessary to disjoin the two suppositions and consider 
them separately. 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 241 

(1.) Upon his own principles it can be evinced that 
consciousness does not immediately give us the fact of 
an absolute beginning. He expressly and uniformly 
teaches that consciousness is only possible in cases in 
which immediate knowledge is involved. We are con- 
scious only of that which we immediately know; and 
the object of immediate knowledge he defines as that 
which is now and here present. Indeed he explicitly 
acknowledges that consciousness is convertible with im- 
mediate knowledge. With him, further, the terms in- 
tuitivo, presentativo and immediate, as characterizing 
knowledge, are treated as equivalents. There can 
scarcely be any mistake as to his doctrine upon this 
subject. He illustrates it very clearly in the case in 
which we reproduce a past event in memory. The event 
itself, as past, is only mediately known through a vica- 
rious image in the mind. What we immediately know 
is, not the past event itself, but the mental modification 
which represents it. Now, says he, we are conscious of 
the representing image as immediately known, but of 
the past event, as only mediately apprehended, we have, 
we can have, no consciousness. If, then, we are con- 
scious of an absolute commencement, it follows from 
his own doctrine that it is immediately known — that it 
is intuitively, presentatively, given; but if so, we are 
face to face with it, we perceive it, and, of course, can 
subsequently construe it in thought ; for it will not be 
denied that we can conceive what has been perceived. 
The perceivable is the very ground of the conceivable; 
the percept becomes, in thought-relations, the concept. 
Every object immediately known may become an object 



242 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

of mediate knowledge, and thought is mediate know- 
ledge. But Hamilton holds that the fact of an absolute 
commencement, as one of the contradictory extremes 
between which the positive judgment of cause is placed, 
is inconceivable — it cannot be conceived as possible. 
His position, therefore, involves the self-contradictory 
assertion that an inconceivable fact, which cannot be 
immediately known, is apprehended in an act of imme- 
diate knowledge; that is, an act of consciousness. He 
refutes himself : We are conscious only of that which is 
immediately known ; that which is immediately known 
cannot be inconceivable, and, to convert the terms, that 
which is inconceivable cannot be immediately known ; 
but an absolute commencement is inconceivable. What 
conclusion can be drawn, but that we cannot be conscious 
of it? 

It being kept in mind that the question now is in 
regard to the immediate testimony of consciousness, it is 
questionable whether, in being conscious of a moral act, 
we are conscious of its freedom. The assumption of 
Hamilton that we are is challenged. 

First. He maintains that we are conscious of acts, 
not of states of mind. The act expresses the mental 
habitude, but not being directly conscious of the latter, 
we immediately infer its existence from the conscious- 
ness of its phenomenal manifestation in actual energy. 
It is the transition from a latent state, condition, habi- 
tude, into exercise of which we are conscious. This 
doctrine I not only believe to be correct, but possessed 
of great practical value. Applying it to the special 
instance in hand, we would be led to the view that, while 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 243 

we are conscious of a moral act of the will, a moral voli- 
tion, as phenomenal, and, therefore, an object of imme- 
diate knowledge, we are not at the same time conscious 
of the freedom which the volition is assumed to express. 
If we know that, it is by an immediate inference — an 
inference so swiftly formed that the freedom appears to 
be involved in the act as a datum of consciousness. It 
happens in this case, as in hundreds of others, that 
reflection is needed to disentangle the inference from 
the fact of consciousness which grounds it. We are 
conscious of the moral act, and, by necessary inference, 
we instantaneously believe in the state of freedom which 
in the act energizes into exercise. 

Secondly. Either the freedom, of which we are said 
to be conscious, is spontaneous, or it is elective — that is, 
involving a power to the contrary. This vitally impor- 
tant distinction is justly signalized by Hamilton him- 
self ; and he correctly maintains that the spontaneity of 
the will is consistent with necessity, while its elective 
freedom is inconsistent with it. Now, according to this 
true position, if, on the one hand, we are, in the con- 
sciousness of a moral act, conscious of spontaneity, we 
are conscious of that which consists with necessity, and 
the very fact for which Hamilton contends is over- 
thrown; but if, on the other hand, we are said to be 
conscious of elective freedom — of power to the contrary, 
the power of otherwise determining — the ground is 
taken that, in being conscious of the act when perform- 
ing it, we are conscious that we might have refrained, 
that we might have chosen the contrary alternative. 
Admit that the opposite alternative was deliberately 



244 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

rejected, and as that is, in the moment of the act's per- 
formance, a past fact, it is clear that we cannot be con- 
scions of it. We remember it. We may believe that we 
have the power of otherwise determining, and that, in 
this particular instance, we may have exerted it differ- 
ently, but, upon Hamilton's doctrine of consciousness 
as immediate knowledge, in which I thoroughly concur, 
these things cannot be objects of consciousness. They 
are only mediately known. 

Thirdly. It may be urged that we are conscious of 
the motives which induce acts, and that in being con- 
scious of the acts, we are, at the same time, of the 
motives. It is granted that we are conscious of motives, 
inasmuch as they are transitive movements in immanent 
states of mind ; but there are several difficulties in this 
view. In the first place, the question occurs, Are the 
motives themselves free ? If so, how ? If spontaneous, 
they consist with necessity. If deliberately elective, the 
choice between contrary alternatives, being a past fact, 
cannot be delivered to us by consciousness. In the sec- 
ond place, motives expire at the moment that the acts 
which they induce are performed. We cannot, there- 
fore, in being conscious of the acts, be conscious of the 
motives, for, ex hypothesis they are past. If, further, it 
be contended that we were conscious of the motives, the 
difficulty returns that, in having been conscious of them, 
the question is whether we were conscious of their free- 
dom, in the sense in which Hamilton regards freedom 
in this relation. In the third place, the question con- 
cerning motives would be irrelevant and damaging to 
Hamilton's position ; for, if in proof of the freedom of 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 245 

acts we have recourse to that of motives to the perform- 
ance of the acts, we admit that the motives exert a 
causal influence upon the acts, for, according to Hamil- 
ton, all must be considered as cause which contributes to 
the occurrence of a phenomenal change. But, in this 
particular discussion, he maintains that a free action of 
the will is uncaused, and hence is to be regarded as an 
absolute commencement. 

Fourthly. It cannot escape notice that the very lan- 
guage in which Hamilton states the proof from con- 
sciousness that the free moral acts of the will are, as 
uncaused, instances of absolute commencement, dis- 
proves the proof. We are conscious, he says, that we are 
the true authors, the responsible originators of our moral 
acts. If, then, Ave produce them, we originate them, we 
cause them, or the language is unmeaning; but if we 
cause them, they are not uncaused — not absolute begin- 
nings. It makes no difference to say that it is the 
generic power in the will, not its specific determinations, 
which is here represented as a cause of acts. Generic or 
specific, the will is the cause of acts. They are not 
uncaused. The question is given up ; but this special 
aspect of the subject may again be adverted to. 

(2.) It having been shown that the fact of an absolute 
commencement cannot, upon Hamilton's own principles, 
be immediately given in a datum of consciousness, it 
remains to inquire whether it can be mediately given in 
such a datum. By this language Hamilton must be 
understood to mean that from a direct datum of con- 
sciousness we derive the necessary inference of an abso- 
lute commencement, and of that inference we are con- 



246 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

scions. He furnishes a special instance : from onr con- 
sciousness of "an uncompromising law of duty/' we 
infer that we are the true authors, the responsible origi- 
nators of our moral acts. They are free, in the sense 
of being undetermined, and, therefore, uncaused. 
Hence our responsibility for them ; hence the very con- 
ception of a moral government. 

One might, were he disposed to be technically exact, 
pause here to inquire whether, in accordance with Ham- 
ilton's definition of consciousness, we are conscious of a 
law of duty. We are conscious of, we immediately 
know, a sense, a feeling, a conviction, of duty, and we 
necessarily infer a law which obliges us, and enforces 
upon us the sanctions of reward and punishment; but 
this will not be dwelt upon. It is cheerfully admitted 
that our necessary inferences from the data of conscious- 
ness are of equal validity with those data themselves, 
and this, notwithstanding the fact that Hamilton him- 
self, in a certain place, disputes their equal certainty. 
It is also readily admitted that, from the direct deliv- 
erances of consciousness, we immediately and necessarily 
infer, and believe that we are the authors and origina- 
tors of our moral actions; but we are forced by that 
inference and belief to hold that if we are authors we 
are the producers, if the orginators we are the efficient 
causes, of our moral actions ; and how that harmonizes 
with the affirmation that those actions are instances of 
an absolute commencement, it passes ingenuity to see. 

Hamilton also argues in favor of an absolute com- 
mencement from our direct consciousness of the fact of 
liberty; but — 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 247 

In the first place, according to his own doctrine, we 
can have no direct consciousness of liberty. What is 
liberty but the power to will freely our acts ? We are 
conscious of the acts, not of the power which they phe- 
nomenally express. Were we conscious of power we 
could describe it as we can every object of perception or 
immediate knowledge ; but who ever perceived power ? 
We believe in its existence; we perceive its manifesta- 
tions. We are not directly conscious of the fact of 
liberty. 

In the second place, if, from the consciousness of the 
fact of liberty, supposing the fact to be a datum of con- 
sciousness, we infer that there is in every free moral act 
an absolute commencement, the same consequences 
would result, as have already been pointed out. We 
would infer that we are the authors, the originators, of 
our moral acts, which is tantamount to saying that we 
are their causes. The inference would, therefore, be, not 
that they are absolute commencements, but that they are 
not. That which is in any way caused cannot be said 
absolutely to commence : it is a relative commencement. 
It will ever be to my mind a matter of amazement that 
he who affirmed that we are the authors and originators 
of our moral acts should maintain that they are uncaused 
— that they are not produced, not originated, but abso- 
lutely begin. 

If Hamilton could have meant to imply that, 
although, in being conscious of a free act of the will, 
we are not directly conscious of an absolute commence- 
ment, yet we infer from the consciousness of liberty the 
power to produce the free act, and that is an absolute 



248 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

commencement, the question is abandoned; for the 
admission that the power to produce, or, what is the 
same, to originate moral acts would be an admission 
that they are produced by that power as their cause, and 
the commencements would not be absolute, but relative. 

If he meant that we are conscious of a belief in an 
absolute commencement, the question arises, Whence 
that belief? Now he contends, and properly contends, 
that our beliefs in transcendent reality — that is, reality 
which is incogitable — are elicited into activity by the 
conditions of conscious experience from fundamental 
laws of belief native to our mental constitution. Would 
he, then, have held that there is, among those connatural 
principles, the law of belief in absolute commencements, 
like those in space, duration, etc., and that this law is 
developed from latency into formal expression by the 
empirical condition of the consciousness of free acts of 
the will ? Certainly not. While he exceptionally held 
that there is no fundamental law of causality, he did not 
affirm, he would not have affirmed, that there is a funda- 
mental law of non-causality. Consciousness, therefore, 
does not mediately and indirectly give us a belief in the 
fact of an absolute commencement. 

Yet, as Hamilton contends that we must, upon the 
testimony of consciousness, believe an absolute com- 
mencement in the case of free moral acts, a serious 
difficulty occurs. If our mental impotence to conceive 
an absolute commencement necessitates the judgment 
that all things are caused, why should not the positive 
testimony of consciousness to an absolute commence- 
ment necessitate the judgment that some things are 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 249 

uncaused ? This contradiction Hamilton does not 
attempt to relieve, and it may be more than doubted 
whether he could have relieved it. The truth is that he 
was wrong in both positions — that of the origin of the 
causal judgment in an impotence of the mind to conceive 
anything as uncaused, and that of the testimony of con- 
sciousness that some things are uncaused. 

The conclusion from the whole argument is that con- 
sciousness neither immediately nor mediately testifies 
to an absolute commencement. 

The real state of the case is that when conscious of 
any act of the will — that is, any volition — we believe in 
our power to produce it. The power in the will we 
believe to be its cause. It is not an uncaused commence- 
ment ; but the power of the will to produce it we believe 
to be caused by the creative power of God. The chain 
of cause and effect is thus uninterrupted, the first link 
being fastened to the throne of God, the cause of 
causes. 

It will be said that, in asserting the generic power of 
the will to be the cause of its acts, no account is taken of 
the causes of its specific determinations. I have, for 
example, the power to will walking, but what is the 
cause of the specific volition to walk eastward rather 
than westward ? The generic power accounts for both, 
but for neither in contradistinction to the other. The 
reply is, first, that all the specific determinations of the 
will are acts of the will — volitions — and each and all are 
immediately referable to the power of the will as their 
cause. To say that one specific determination must 
originate from another preceding it, and so on ad infini- 



250 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

turn, is to deny the power of the will to choose — the 
power considered by Edwards himself to be its definitive 
characteristic. The will itself has the power to elect 
between the alternative of walking in one direction or 
in the opposite. Secondly, the question whether this 
election is not determined by the apprehensions of the 
understanding, and not by the decision of the will — the 
question between the determinist and his opponents — is 
one irrelevant to the present discussion ; for if it were 
granted that the specific volition • is determined by the 
last view of the understanding, it is conceded that it is 
caused by the power of the understanding — that it is 
not an absolute commencement, an uncaused cause. 

Were that question pertinent, I would say that the 
will has the mysterious, divinely given, power to appro- 
priate the representations of the understanding, the 
impulses of the feelings and the prescriptions of the 
conscience, and to assimilate them into its own sponta- 
neity. They become directions to its specific determina- 
tions, furnish the final, not the efficient, causes of those 
determinations. The power of the will itself is their 
real, though derived and dependent, efficient cause. It 
is in this elective power of the will that our personal 
responsibility is grounded. 1 

2. Hamilton's statement touching the relation to two 
contradictory extremes of the causal judgment is liable 
to serious objection. 

It is not intended now to criticise his theory of the 
conditioned in its general application to positive 

1 This question is considered at some length in the writer's 
treatise on "The Will in its Theological Relations." 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 251 

thought, hut its special applicatiou to cause. According 
to him, as we have seen, the causal judgment lies between 
— is conditioned by — two inconceivable extremes, which 
are contradictories. Upon the principle of excluded 
middle, one of these must be true. These contradictory 
extremes are: an absolute commencement and an 
infinite series of relative commencements. This state- 
ment of the case is exposed to challenge. The real 
contradictories are: an absolute commencement and a 
relative commencement. To state them in other but 
equivalent words : a commencement which had no cause, 
and a commencement which had a cause. A commence- 
ment without a cause, a commencement from a cause — 
these, in the first instance, are the real contradicto- 
ries. 

Now of these one must be false, the other true ; for 
there is no possibility of a middle supposition. On 
Hamilton's own principles, it has been already shown 
that the alternative of an absolute commencement must 
be rejected. It is the false member of this pair of 
contradictories. The other, therefore, must be true — 
namely, a commencement from a cause, a relative com- 
mencement. 

There, then, emerges another pair of contradictories : 
a self-caused series of commencements and a series of 
commencements caused by a power outside of itself — 
self -caused ; caused by another. To state the contradic- 
tion distinctly: a series of commencements self -caused; 
a series of commencements not self-caused. 

In Hamilton's statement of the two contradictories 
which exclude a middle, there is the confusion of a single 



252 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

element with a series of elements. The comparison 
ought, in the first instance, to be limited to single ele- 
ments. A thing must be regarded either as absolutely 
beginning — that is, beginning without a cause — or as 
caused. To bring in a series prematurely is to destroy 
the true state of the question. 

Now, having settled the question, which of the two 
contradictories as to a single existence is true, we are 
prepared to take up the further question, which of these 
contradictories is true — a self-caused series, or a series 
begun by an extraneous cause. The first supposition 
cannot be true, because it involves self-contradiction. A 
series, ex vi termini, consists of parts, limited and condi- 
tioned parts. Each of these must have had a beginning, 
and that beginning must have had a cause. What is 
predicable of all the parts is predicable of the whole. 
Consequently, the whole series must have had a begin- 
ning — that is, the whole series must have been caused. 1 
And as no part has the cause of its beginning in itself, 
neither can the series as a whole. As no part is abso- 
lutely commenced, neither is the series. We are shut 
up, then, to adopt the other contradictory — namely, that 
the series had a cause extraneous to itself. 

Having thus stated the case as it really is, let us more 
particularly examine its distinct elements. 

(1.) Let us look at the hypothesis of an absolute com- 
mencement. 

First. We have seen that, upon Hamilton's own 
principles, consciousness cannot deliver to us the fact. 
Consciousness supposes immediate knowledge, and as 

1 See Discussion of the Argument for the Being of God, etc. 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 253 

what is admitted to be inconceivable cannot be imme- 
diately known, an absolute commencement cannot be an 
object of consciousness. That proof of the alleged fact 
is destroyed. 

Secondly. We cannot believe the alleged fact. It 
is as incredible, as it is inconceivable. It contradicts 
our fundamental convictions. We cannot believe that 
finite power can produce something out of nothing, or 
that any finite thing can exist, any event can occur, with 
nothing as its cause. The maxim, ex nihilo nihil fit,, so 
far as the power of the creature is concerned, is impreg- 
nable; but a cause which is not an effect springs from 
nothing. On the contrary, every finite cause, we must 
believe, is itself caused by something. 

Thirdly. What is it which Hamilton affirms that we 
are impotent to conceive ? This : that the sum or com- 
plement of existence is increased by a free act of the 
will, or, more broadly, by any cause in the production 
of its effect. True; a free act of the will does not 
increase the sum of existence — that is, of existing being. 
ISTo finite act can add to the complement of being, for 
no finite act can create being ; but finite power is com- 
petent to effect a change, to a certain extent, in the 
phenomena of existing being; and such change alters 
the form or mode of being without making a substantive 
addition to it. We are, therefore, not impotent to con- 
ceive an addition to the phenomenal charges of being; 
and as every change demands a cause for it, we are 
positively led to postulate for it a cause. This is not 
the result of impotence, but a fruit of power; not of a 
negative, but a positive, necessity. 



254 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

Fourthly. If these things be so, Hamilton's argu- 
ment against the view that the law of causality is 
original and underived breaks down. That argument is 
that nothing is to be assumed as an original, special 
principle of the mind, operating by a positive necessity, 
which can be shown to result from a mere mental power- 
lessness. The causal judgment, he contends, is in this 
category: it is enforced by a negative necessity occa- 
sioned by an inability of the mind to conceive the 
contrary. Hence there is no original, fundamental law, 
no special, positive principle, of causality in the mind. 
His minor — namely, that the causal judgment is derived 
from a mental impotence — has been shown to be incon- 
clusive. The law of parsimony, consequently, does not 
exclude the supposition of an original and fundamental 
law of belief in the relation of cause and effect. 

Fifthly. The other argument of Hamilton against 
such a positive, fundamental law of belief also gives 
way — to-wit, that, as consciousness affirms the fact of an 
absolute commencement, it contradicts the hypothesis of 
an original law which demands a cause for everything 
which begins to be ; and that our nature would be self- 
contradictory" and mendacious on the supposition of the 
existence of such a law and of the testimony of conscious- 
ness in opposition to it; but we have seen that con- 
sciousness makes no such affirmation. The contra- 
diction, therefore, does not exist. 

Sixthly. We fall back, then, upon the doctrine that 
the law of causality is fundamental and underived ; that 
is, an original, special, positive principle in the human 
constitution. It stands the tests of such a principle. It 



Hamilton's Doctrine of Causation. 255 

is self-evident ; it is simple ; it is necessary. Its neces- 
sity is proved by its universality. 

Seventhly. If, with exceptional and perverse thinkers, 
the ground be taken that there is no such thing as the 
relation between cause and effect, but that consciousness 
merely affirms a relation of antecedence and sequence, 
it is submitted that the doctrine of an absolute com- 
mencement is out of harmony with that hypothesis ; for 
an absolute commencement supposes the absence of any 
antecedent having a peculiar relation to it. It is out 
of relation to any antecedent — it absolutely begins. 

Upon every supposition, therefore, which can be made 
an absolute commencement is excluded. It is both incon- 
ceivable and incredible: it is, as to the experience of 
finite beings, impossible. The hypothesis of casualism 
is shown to be untenable. 

(2.) We have seen that the first pair of contradictories 
which we encounter is this: an uncaused commence- 
ment — a caused commencement; in other words, an 
absolute commencement — a relative commencement. 
The first member has been disproved. Upon the prin- 
ciple of excluded middle, therefore, we are shut up to 
adopt the second as true ; that is, what begins to be is 
caused. The hypothesis of causation is established. 

Now, then, there emerges another pair of contradic- 
tories : an uncaua 3d series of relative commencements — 
a caused series of relative commencements ; the first the 
hypothesis of fatalism, the second, that of theism. Upon 
the principle of excluded middle, one of these must be 
true, the other false. 

The hypothesis of an uncaused series of relative com- 



256 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

mencement — that of fatalism — is self-contradictory, 
and therefore false. Each element in the series is a 
relative commencement — that is, each is caused. But 
what is predicable of all the parts is predicable of the 
whole. As no part is uncaused, neither can the whole 
be uncaused. The first link in the series is caused. To 
say that all the parts, including the first, are caused, 
and that the whole is uncaused, is a contradiction. The 
hypothesis, being self-contradictory, must be discarded. 
The other member of this pair of contradictories must, 
then, be accepted as true — namely, a caused series of 
relative commencements. The hypothesis of theism is 
established. 

There are two additional considerations which may 
be suggested with reference to Hamilton's statement of 
his contradictories : 

First. If our inability to conceive an absolute com- 
mencement compels us to judge that everything which 
appears to begin had a previous existence in another 
form ; that is, that it did not really begin, why should 
not, by parity of reason, our inability to conceive an 
infinite series of relative commencements necessitate the 
judgment that it began? Hamilton substantially ad- 
mits the latter of these alternatives, but evades the 
difficulty created by this consideration. It involves, 
however, as serious a contradiction as any which he has 
signalized. 

Secondly. If his contradictory extremes are both 
inconceivable, how is the contradiction apprehended? 
The law of contradiction he emphasizes as one of 
thought. In order that the contradiction may be 



Hamilton's Docteine of Causation. 257 

thought, must not the contradictory extremes be them- 
selves thought ? But he holds that they are unthinkable. 
This difficulty is noticed for the purpose of calling atten- 
tion to the fact that Hamilton overlooks the great 'princi- 
ple that in nearly all our mental processes, certainly in 
those concerned about transcendental reality, our 
thought- judgments and our faith- judgments are insepa- 
rably connected. They cannot be divorced without 
making the principle of antinomy dominate our mental 
constitution. Kant's, Hamilton's and Manse? s antilo- 
gies may all be got rid of, or brought into harmony upon 
the principle to which attention has just been directed. 
The apparent self-contradictoriness of the human reason 
will, to a great extent, vanish, if we will apprehend 
thought and faith as discharging, according to God's 
appointment, joint and complementary offices. As long, 
on the one hand, as philosophy assays the impossible 
task of confining itself to the limited sphere of thought, 
it shuts against itself the gates of ontology; while, on 
the other hand, if it substitutes the measures of thought 
for those of faith, it may indeed assume to enter the 
boundless field of ontology, but it will be like a boy 
attempting to compass the ocean with his fishing-line. 
To do the former is, with the sensualist, to crawl like a 
worm upon the earth ; to do the latter is, with the abso- 
lutist, to soar into the heavens upon the waxen wings 
of Icarus. "What God hath joined together, let not man 
put asunder." 

This leads to the further remark that Sir William 
Hamilton has, in this discussion, greatly erred by speak- 
ing of knowledge as restricted to thought, and by inti- 



258 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

mating that a science incorporating into itself the 
unconditioned would be impossible. If either of these 
positions were true, philosophy, like theology, would 
be impossible. A science of philosophy, or a science of 
theology, dealing only with the matter supplied by the 
thinking faculty, and discarding the "revelation," as 
Hamilton himself calls it, of our fundamental laws of 
belief, would, let it be repeated, a sheer impossibility. 
Neither of them is simply a science of the conditioned, 
or a science of the unconditioned ; but both weave into 
one great, harmonious whole, the conditioned and the 
unconditioned, the finite and the infinite, the judgments 
of thought and the judgments of faith. 

3. Hamilton's theory concerning cause seems, at a 
vital point, to be based upon a shadowy distinction — 
the distinction between an inability not to form the 
causal judgment and the positive necessity of forming it. 
One finds it difficult to perceive any distinction worth 
mentioning between the propositions : I cannot but judge 
thus and so; I must judge thus and so. True, one is 
negative, the other positive ; but they express the same 
thought. 

Furthermore, the same predication may be made in 
regard to all our original, fundamental laws of belief. 
Some principles at the foundation of our mental nature 
Hamilton admits to be special and positive ; for example, 
belief in existence, space, time. Now is it not competent 
to say that we are unable not to believe in. existence, in 
space, in time ? Is this not true ? The sort of inability 
which he affirms in regard to our judgments touching 
cause and substance, as differentiating them, appears to 



Hamilton's Docteine of Causation. 259 

be equally predicable of those touching existence, space 
and time ; and if this is not a mistake, nothing is gained 
by Hamilton's use of the law of parsimony in this mat- 
ter. His negative necessity practically merges into a 
positive, his mental powerlessness into a mental power. 
After all, according to the illustrious philosopher 
himself, we must believe in cause ; and if the foregoing 
arguments have not wholly failed, they have shown that 
the principle of causality is one of the special, original, 
underived laws of belief, concerning which he says with 
equal truth and beauty : 

" By a wonderful revelation, we are thus, in the very conscious- 
ness of our inability to conceive aught above the relative and 
finite, inspired with a belief in the existence of something beyond 
the sphere of all comprehensible reality." 



THE AGNOSTIC DOCTRINE OF THE 
RELATIVITY OF KNOWLEDGE, AS 
EXPOUNDED BY MR. HERBERT 
SPENCER. 



THE doctrine of Mr. Spencer seems to be : that only 
that which conies under the cognizance of the pre- 
sentative, the representative and the thinking faculties is 
knowable; all else is unknowable. Phenomena as ob- 
jects of sensation, perception, imagination and thought 
are known ; the reality which underlies them cannot be 
known. It is not in relation to our faculties, and what- 
soever is not in relation to them is unknowable. That 
Mr. Spencer includes thought as a ground of knowledge 
is evident from the following utterance, when he is pro- 
fessedly discussing the relativity of knowledge: a Thus, 
from the very nature of thought, the relativity of our 
knowledge is inferable in three several ways. As we 
find by analyzing it, and as we see it objectively dis- 
played in every proposition, a thought involves relation, 
difference, likeness. Whatever does not present each of 
these does not admit of cognition. And hence we may 
say that the unconditioned, as presenting none of them, 
is trebly unthinkable." * Whatever, then, is unthink- 
able is unknowable. Thought is the measure of cogni- 
tion. 

1 First Principles, p. 82. 

260 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 261 

But Mr. Spencer affirms a reality which transcends 
thought. This he denominates the absolute — the ulti- 
mate of ultimates, upon which religion and science are 
destined to be harmonized. This absolute something he 
designates as fundamental reality. What is it? It is 
force — the central and universal force of which the spe- 
cific forces of nature are expressions, and upon which 
they are correlated into unity. This force he character- 
izes as an "infinite and eternal energy." But this won- 
derful, transcendent, infinite reality, which is funda- 
mental to the universe, is unknowable. It is out of re- 
lation to our faculties of knowledge. It is the uncon- 
ditioned, and consequently lies beyond the conditioning 
predicates of "relation, difference, likeness." 

Of this unknowable, absolute, infinite thing it is af- 
firmed that it exists. It is not nothing. It is, it op- 
erates, it causes ; it is the explanation of phenomena — 
the key of the universe. It is just here that Mr. Spencer 
professedly breaks with the agnostic positivist of the 
school of Comte. The French agnostic affirms noth- 
ing beyond the phenomenal, the English affirms funda- 
mental reality — a force which is all-pervading and col- 
lects all special forces into its comprehensive unity. 
Now, the question necessarily arises, Whence this af- 
firmation ? What can we affirm of that concerning 
which we confessedly know nothing? How does Mr. 
Spencer meet this difficulty? His answer is: that we 
are indefinitely conscious of the absolute and funda- 
mental reality. This grounds our ability to make any 
affirmation in regard to it, and necessitates that affirma- 
tion. Let us pause to emphasize this mode of appre- 



262 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

hending the absolute, which at the same time is unknow- 
able. It is indefinite consciousness. 

It is not now intended to submit this theory of relative 
knowledge to anything like a thorough examination, but 
only to indicate briefly the points at which it is con- 
ceived to break down. 

(1.) Mr. Spencer arbitrarily and unjustifiably limits 
the number of the human faculties. Grant him his as- 
sumption, that there are no other faculties but those 
which are either pre-supposed by that of thought as con- 
ditioning its exercise, or constitutive of thought itself, 
and one would have little disposition to deny that what 
is out of relation to these faculties would be out of rela- 
tion to the human mind as cognitive, and consequently 
could not by us be known, for it is conceded that what is 
out of all relation to our faculties cannot by us be known. 
But if there be any other cognitive faculty or power 
than those which Mr. Spencer enumerates, the case 
would, of course, be vastly different. What would be 
out of relation to them would be in relation to that sup- 
posed to exist in addition to them. If, for example, we 
have a believing faculty, over and beyond the thinking 
faculty, whajs is out of relation to thought might be in 
relation to faith. It behooved Mr. Spencer to show 
convincingly that there is, that there can be, no such ad- 
ditional faculty before he could establish his position 
that what is not related to the thinking faculty is not re- 
lated to cognition at all — that the unthinkable is neces- 
sarily the unknowable. In defect of such proof, his ar- 
gument fails to specify all the suppositions possible, and 
would be therefore fatally defective. But more of this 
anon. 



Spencer's Eelativitt of Knowledge. 263 

(2.) Mr. Spencer unwarrantably confounds the 
know able and the thinkable. He makes them the sub- 
ject of common predication. Only what is thinkable is 
knowable. This is a tremendous assumption, and needs 
to be established by the clearest and most incontestable 
proofs. If he has not furnished them, or if it can be 
shown that, in consequence of this identification of the 
cogitable and the cognoscible, he involves himself in 
self-contradiction, the foundation is swept from the ag- 
nostic feature of his system. 

First, it is sometimes intimated that Mr. Spencer has 
carried out the views of Sir William Hamilton upon this 
subject to their logical conclusion. This is a great mis- 
take. How far Mr. Spencer has claimed to concur with 
the doctrine of the Scottish philosopher, and how far 
to differ from it, I do not undertake to say. It is cer- 
tain that he did profess to adopt it to some extent. For, 
in discriminating his position from that of M. Compte 
in regard to the cardinal principles connected with the 
relativity of knowledge which are distinctive of the 
"positive philosophy," he remarks 1 : "Such clarifications 
of ideas on these ultimate questions as I can trace to any 
particular teacher I owe to Sir William Hamilton." 
This justifies the questions, Does Mr. Spencer's doc- 
trine of the unknowable coincide with that of Hamil- 
ton ? Did the views of the Scottish philosophers logi- 
cally conduce to those of the agnostics ? It must be ad- 
mitted that Hamilton did at times restrict the term 
hioivledge to what is immediately known. It is this 
circumstance which has occasioned the grievous charge 
1 Recent Discussions, etc., p. 122. 



264 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

that he denied the cognoscibility of God. He might, it 
would seem, have effectually answered Professor Calder- 
wood's criticism upon his doctrine of the infinite by 
simply affirming that he maintained a knowledge of the 
Infinite. This, however, he did not do. Notwithstand- 
ing this, it may be shown, from his catholic teachings, 
that a negative answer must be returned to the fore- 
going questions. 

In the first place, he expressly makes a distinction be- 
tween immediate and mediate knowledge. "Conscious- 
ness," says he, "is an immediate, not a mediate, know- 
ledge." "It may be proper here," he remarks in another 
place, "to consider more particularly a matter of which 
we have hitherto treated only by the way — I mean the 
distinction of immediate or intuitive, in contrast to 
mediate or representative knowledge." After pro- 
nouncing this distinction "most important," and elabo- 
rately expounding it, he proceeds to observe: "Such are 
the two kinds of knowledge which it is necessary to dis- 
tinguish, and such are the principal contrasts they pre- 
sent, . . . The names given in the schools to the im- 
mediate and mediate cognitions were intuitive and ab- 
stractive, meaning by the latter term not merely what 
we, with them, call abstract knowledge, but also the rep- 
resentations of concrete objects in the imagination of 
memory." Other passages might be cited to the same 
effect, but these are sufficient to show that Hamilton re- 
garded knowledge as generic, containing under it two 
species, immediate and mediate. Of course, his mediate 
knowledge must be knowledge, or the terms are unmean- 
ing and the reduction absurd. 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 265 

In the second place, he affirmed the knowledge, 
through memory, of the past. This, in opposition to 
Reid, he denied to be immediate knowledge, and conse- 
quently admitted that there is a knowledge, a valid 
knowledge, which is not immediate. Let one explicit 

testimony suffice: 

" We are said, for example, to know a past occurrence, when 
we represent it to the mind in an act of memory. We know the 
mental representation, and this we do immediately and in itself, 
and are also said to know the past occurrence, as mediately know- 
ing it through the mental modification which represents it. Now, 
we are conscious of the representation as immediately known, but 
we cannot be said to be conscious of the thing represented, which, 
if known, is only known through its representation. If, there- 
fore, mediate knowledge be in propriety a knowledge, conscious- 
ness is not co-extensive with knowledge." 

Hamilton is obliged, in accordance with common 
sense, to allow a knowledge of the past through memory 
— a knowledge which is not immediate, for the events 
known are not phenomenal to consciousness. Any other 
view would be absurd in theory, and impossible in fact. 
If the past could not be known, the business of life, the 
relations of society and the processes of courts would be 
reduced to the category of the hypothetical. Past busi- 
ness contracts would be matters of surmise, a man at 
three score years and ten could only conjecture that he 
had had a wife and children, and a murderer would be 
hanged in consequence of a guess. To say that our own 
history is not an object of knowledge, because it is not 
now and here present in consciousness, would be to 
stultify the human intelligence, to subvert morality, and 
to represent the world as a lunatic asylum. It is true 
that Hamilton by a stubborn use of a technicality — 



266 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

and this obstinacy has caused him to be greatly misun- 
derstood and misstated — continually affirms the con- 
vertibility of knowledge with immediate knowledge; 
and yet he is ever compelled to admit a mediate know- 
ledge. In this he is inconsistent with himself, and no 
expositor of his catholic views, who desires to do him 
justice, can avoid harmonizing him with himself by 
pointing out the view maintained by him in regard to 
knowledge as generic, including under it two specific 
forms of knowledge, immediate and mediate. That he 
should have assigned a pre-eminence to that which is 
immediate over that which is mediate, is one of the 
most serious defects of his philosophy. It was to exalt 
means above ends. 

In the third place, Hamilton maintained a distinction 
between empirical and philosophical knowledge. Hav- 
ing illustrated the distinction, he thus recapitulates: 

" There are two kinds and degrees of knowledge. The first is 
a knowledge that a thing is . . . and it is called the knowledge 
of the fact, historical or empirical knowledge. The second is a 
knowledge why or how a thing is . . . and is termed the know- 
ledge of the cause, philosophical, scientific, rational knowledge." 

That he makes the latter kind of knowledge not only 
transcend sense-perception, and consciousness but 
thought, is evinced by the following passage with which 
the discussion of the distinction closes : 

" Philosophy thus, as the knowledge of effects in their causes, 
necessarily tends, not towards a plurality of ultimate or first 
causes, but towards one alone. The first cause — the Creator — it 
can indeed never reach, as an object of immediate knowledge; but 
as the convergence towards unity in the ascending series is mani- 
fest, in so far as that series is within our view, and as it is even 
impossible for the mind to suppose the convergence not continuous 



Spexcek's Eexativity of Knowledge. 267 

and complete, it follows — unless all analogy be rejected — unless 
our intelligence be declared a lie — that we must, philosophically, 
believe in that ultimate or primary unity, which, in our present 
existence, we are not destined in itself to apprehend." 

There are three things in this utterance that are note- 
worthy. First, that he allows of knowledge which is con- 
tradistinguished to immediate ; secondly, that he affirms 
a knowledge which overpasses thought, since he steadily 
avers that we cannot think a Creator — a God; and 
thirdly, that he characterizes belief as a kind of know- 
ledge — we have a philosophical knowledge of the "ulti- 
mate or primary unity" by believing in it. 

In the fourth place, he ranks among the "cognitive 
faculties" that which he denominates the "regulative," 
which he considers as the locus principiorum — the seat 
of the fundamental laws of thought and belief. These 
he sometimes characterizes as primary "cognitions," 
and in one place while speaking of them says: "Being 
as primary, inexplicable; as inexplicable, incompre- 
hensible, [they] must consequently manifest themselves 
less in the character of cognitions than of facts, of which 
consciousness assures us under the simple form of feel- 
ing or belief." These roots of cognition develop them- 
selves not alone in thought, but also in faith. It is mani- 
fest, then, that Hamilton assigned to the beliefs, actually 
springing from this cognitive root, the character of 
knowledge. Otherwise he would have contradicted him- 
self at a point fundamental to his system. 

In the fifth place, in expounding the "philosophy of 
the conditioned," upon which he staked much of his 
reputation as a philosophical thinker, he lays down this 
law of positive thought: "All that is conceivable in 



268 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

thought lies between two extremes, which, as contra- 
dictory of each other, cannot both be true, but of which, 
as mutual contradictories, one must." These mutual 
contradictories, as inconceivable, are, of course, inap- 
prehensible by thought. Were thought the only power 
we possessed, we could not know even their existence. 
But, upon the principle of excluded middle, one of these 
unthinkable extremes must be true. Now, if we may be 
convinced that one of them is true, we must know the 
fact. How it could be to us true, without our knowing 
it to be true, it is impossible to see. The conclusion is 
irresistible that Hamilton held the inconceivable — the 
unthinkable, to be knowable. The limits of thought 
were not, to him, the limits of knowledge. While we 
cannot think the unconditioned, for to think is to condi- 
tion, we may yet know it. How ? He answers, By 
believing in it. 

In the sixth place, he explicitly affirms our knowledge 
of God. "Mind," he observes, "rises to its highest dig- 
nity when viewed as the object through which, and 
through which alone, our unassisted reason can ascend 
to the knowledge of a God. The Deity is not an object 
of immediate .contemplation; as existing and in himself, 
he is beyond our reach ; we can know him only mediately 
through his works." Again he says : "We must believe 
in the infinity of God; but the infinite God cannot by 
us, in the present limitation of our faculties, be com- 
prehended or conceived. A Deity understood would be 
no Deity at all ; and it is blasphemy to say that God only 
is as we are able to think him to be. We know God ac- 
cording to the finitude of our faculties ; but we believe 



Spencek's Relativity of Knowledge. 269 

much that we are incompetent properly to know/' — 
[that is, to know immediately.'] 

Here we have Hamilton's doctrine of the cognosci- 
bility of God. We cannot perceive, or conceive him. 
He is not thinkable. We are not conscious of him, and 
as he contends that "thought cannot transcend conscious- 
ness," he holds that God is not an object of thought, as 
he is infinite. In this he has the support of almost all 
theologians. But we know him mediately by faith — 
that is, our knowledge of him is inferential, the inference 
being a special faith-judgment, enforced by the funda- 
mental laws of belief elicited into formal expression by 
the conditions of experience. What is peculiar to Ham- 
ilton's view is that this knowledge is not affirmed to be 
knowledge proper which he, I must think, arbitrarily 
confines to consciousness as the complement of internal 
and external perception. But whatever may have been 
his view in regard to the question of restricting the 
term knowledge, in rigid propriety of speech, to that 
which is immediate, he certainly admitted and main- 
tained a knowledge of occult realities transcending the 
phenomenal sphere — of material substance, the soul, 
God and immortality. In a word, he was no agnostic, 
either professedly or by necessary implication ; and — 

In the seventh place, all doubt in regard to his posi- 
tion is removed, and his doctrine rendered conspicu- 
ously clear, by what he has said concerning the subject 
itself of the relativity of knowledge. 

"Whatever we know," he remarks, "or endeavor to know, God 
or the world — mind or matter — the distant or the near — we know, 
and can know, only in so far as we possess a faculty of knowing 



270 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

in general; and we can only exercise that faculty under the laws 
which control and limit its operations. However great, and 
infinite, and various, therefore, may be the universe and its con- 
tents — these are known to us, not as they exist, but as our mind 
is capable of knowing them." 

These considerations serve to show how wide is the 
difference between the views of Hamilton and those of 
Mr. Spencer. The latter limits the knowable to the 
thinkable, and therefore maintains that as the Infinite 
is unthinkable, it is unknowable. The former, while he 
too held that the Infinite is unthinkable, and, in that 
sense, unknowable, also maintained that the Infinite is 
believable, and, in that sense, knowable. In other words, 
while Hamilton denied that God can be immediately 
known, he affirmed that he is mediately known. We 
cannot know him, as infinite, by thought; we can, and 
do, by faith. He did not identify the thinkable and the 
knowable, and cannot, therefore, be regarded as logi- 
cally responsible for the agnostic doctrine that God is 
altogether unknowable. 

But with these explanations which a candid and im- 
partial exposition of his doctrine requires it is to be 
regretted that so great a man as Hamilton, Christian 
philosopher as he was, should sometimes have asserted 
unqualifiedly that God, as infinite, is unknowable. It 
would have been better had he contented himself with 
maintaining that the Deity is not, as infinite, an ob- 
ject of consciousness, of conception, of thought — in a 
word, that he is not comprehensible. This would have 
been sufficient to have evinced his opposition to the doc- 
trine of the German absolutists and of Cousin ; and, in 
doing this, he would have been sustained by the decla- 



Spestcek's Relativity of Knowledge. 271 

rations of the sacred Scriptures and by the verdict of all 
true theology. In adhering to the employment of the 
term unknowable in application to the Infinite — to God, 
when his terminology was criticised by those who had 
not thoroughly grasped his meaning, he rendered him- 
self liable to be misunderstood, and even misrepre- 
sented, by those who ought to have been his friends and 
supporters ; a fact which has received an illustration in 
the hostile construction of his views by such writers as 
Dr. Henry Calderwood, Dr. James McCosh and Dr. 
Charles Hodge. 

Secondly, in confounding the thinkable and the know- 
able, Mr. Spencer has made the prodigious philosophi- 
cal blunder of restricting all knowledge within the con- 
fines of the thinking faculty. If the thinking faculty — 
the discursive, the comparative, the elaborative, the 
reasoning, faculty — is, in its operations, confined to the 
materials furnished by perception internal and exter- 
nal; if, to use Hamilton's language, "Thought cannot 
transcend consciousness/' and there be no other faculty 
endowed with a higher power and possessed of a wider 
scope, it must be conceded that the incogitable would be 
the unknowable. This is Mr. Spencer's position, al- 
though we shall see as the discussion advances that in 
maintaining it he is inconsistent with himself. That 
there is a power or faculty — the name is immaterial — 
which passes beyond the limits of perception, which 
transcends consciousness, and soars beyond the flight of 
thought, I shall now endeavor to show. If this can be 
done, it will be proved that the thinkable does not ex- 
haust the contents of the knowable — that we can know 



272 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

what we cannot think. Keference is had to the believ- 
ing faculty, or briefly, faith, containing implicitly the 
power to believe, and energizing explicitly into the spe- 
cial acts of belief or faith. 

Belief or faith — the words will be used interchange- 
ably — is, as the product of a power, an energy actually 
exerted, frequently complex. Its initial element is in- 
tellectual assent, and so far it is cognitive ; but it often 
involves the feeling of trust, and sometimes an act of 
the will deliberately electing to concur with the assent 
of the understanding and the feeling of the heart. A 
student, engaged upon a geometrical theorem may as- 
sent to an axiom, with no consciousness of feeling. One 
may listen to a statement of fact with the same absence 
of emotion. But where one's personal interests are con- 
cerned the intellectual assent is colored by the feeling 
of reliance, and in case a struggle occurs between con- 
flicting evidence and feelings the mental assent is ac- 
companied by the election of the will as well as by the 
emotion of trust. It is almost needless to remark that 
the purport of the present discussion requires that our 
view be limited to that aspect of faith in which it is 
simply cognitive. The very question is, whether there 
be such a cognitive power as one of belief, and whether 
it evolves into actual knowledge. 

In the first place, there is a powerful antecedent pre- 
sumption in favor of the existence of such a faculty. 
Man is so helpless and dependent that his nature would 
seem to be left without sufficient provision for its wants, 
were it not warranted by its very constitution to believe 
in a power higher and greater than itself and than all 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 273 

the forces which threaten it, to which it could appeal 
for help in distress, protection from danger and suc- 
cor in need. Without such a faith, or at least without a 
tendency to it, the nature of man would be to him an in- 
soluble puzzle. Reflection could only lead to the con- 
clusion that it was either the product of chance, or had 
its origin in a malignant source. The case would be dif- 
ferent were men able to defend themselves from evil by 
the exercise of sagacity and precaution. This, how- 
ever, is not so. "No amount of forethought, no ac- 
quaintance with physical forces, no mastery of science, 
and no knowledge of remedial agencies avail to ward 
off the visitation of calamity or the stroke of death. 
Could men help themselves, very few would suffer and 
die. It is no answer to this to say that men do suffer 
and die whether or not they believe in a Higher Power, 
for it might be that such a belief conditions the trans- 
mutation of suffering into happiness and death into 
life — a supposition actually confirmed by the Scrip- 
tures as a professed revelation from heaven. 

This presumption is verified by the well-nigh uni- 
versal experience of the race. ~Ro tribe of men, of whom 
we have any trustworthy account, has been destitute of 
some belief in a superior power — a belief which grounds 
a kind of natural religiousness. The fact that in some 
instances it is feeble and hardly appreciable, constitutes 
no objection to this view. Its feeble existence proves its 
existence. Reason is but little developed in some speci- 
mens of the human race, but who would argue from that 
fact that there are some tribes of men wholly devoid of 
reason ? Were there no intelligence, there could be no 



274 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

education. That all men are possessed of a belief — 
greater or less — in a superior power is admitted by Mr. 
Spencer himself in his account of the genesis and evo- 
lution of the religious sentiment. Concede that it be- 
gins in Fetichism, it begins. Fetichism, the evolution- 
ist himself being judge, is but the expression of a feel- 
ing, a principle, a faith — call it what one may — which 
is native to the human breast. There is a natural ten- 
dency in men, growing out of or concurring with their 
helplessness and dependence to believe in some higher 
power able to bless or to curse. That fact proves the 
existence in man of a believing faculty. If not, the 
tendency has no cause. 

In addition, it deserves remark that the ghosts, the 
other selves of the dead, which, according to Mr. 
Spencer, haunt burial places, hover about the abodes of 
the living, and become objects of worship to ignorant 
savages, are not perceived by them, but only believed in. 
Who ever really saw a human spirit? Who ever per- 
ceived one? Who, then, is able to think one? But 
these ignorant barbarians worship them as present. For 
what reason except that they believe in them ? Imagine 
them they cannot, for imagination depends for its ma- 
terials upon perception; nor can imagination combine 
those materials into a human spirit, for, confessedly, 
it is one and uncompounded. Even the physiological 
psychologist would hardly contend that he can create by 
fancy the image of a human soul ; and what he cannot 
do it is not supposable that a Bushman could. The 
same is true, in a higher degree, if possible, of M. 
Compte's and Mr. Frederic Harrison's ideal humanity 



Spencek's Kelativity of Knowledge. 275 

as an object of worship. It is a pure abstraction. As 
such, it certainly cannot be perceived. Otherwise it 
would be an abstraction and a phenomenon at one and 
the same time. It must therefore be an object of faith. 
And so we have from all these writers an admission of 
the existence of faith as grounding the possibility of 
worship. 

In the second place, there are things innumerable, 
the effects of which are matters of daily observation, 
that are utterly incomprehensible. They lie beyond 
the compass of perception, and therefore are unthink- 
able. And yet we are so profoundly convinced of their 
existence that we may be truly said to know it. No one 
has ever perceived the occult forces of nature, the effects 
of which he observes. Who has ever perceived gravity, 
or electricity, or magnetism, or chemical affinity ? And 
yet can he doubt their existence ? If he cannot perceive 
them, if he is not conscious of them as they are in them- 
selves, he cannot think them. How, then, does he ap- 
prehend their existence? The answer is, by believing 
in it. What can we perceive of life itself? Nothing. 
Have we then no apprehension of it ? We believe in it. 
In all these cases we know by believing. From the ef- 
fects which are phenomenal we infer the forces them- 
selves as their causes. That inference is simply a judg- 
ment of faith. There is no other way of accounting for 
our conviction of the unperceivable and incogitable 
reality. We are so constituted as to believe in existences 
which we cannot comprehend. What we are able to per- 
ceive of the universe, vast as it is, is but little compared 
with the immeasurable systems which we are convinced 



276 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

stretch away beyond observation into boundless space. 
Why the conviction? We believe. We know because 
we believe. Have we, then, no faculty of faith ? 

To this it may be replied that we can imagine reaches 
of the stellar universe beyond the scope of perception. 
Certainly. But that imagination is only of objects 
analogous to those of perception, and constitutes no 
guarantee of their existence. The representations of 
the imagination assure us of corresponding objective 
realities, only when they reproduce in the images actual 
percepts. Otherwise, imagination gives only the pos- 
sible. The imagination of worlds beyond the revelations 
of the telescope could never certify us of their real ex- 
istence. But of that existence we are convinced. The 
conviction is the offspring of faith. 

In the third place, the sciences, both the exact and 
the physical, begin, continue and end with faith. 

Their fundamental principles are undemonstrated 
and indemonstrable. They are axiomatic pre-supposi- 
tions spontaneously suggested by the very constitution 
of our nature, which are necessarily accepted as the 
foundations and conditions of every process of thought. 
They are relied upon with the most perfect conviction 
of their truth ; but if this conviction is not engendered 
by rational proof, if it is not the result of reasoning, 
there is but one other way of accounting for it, and that 
is, that it is a faith. By a necessity of our mental con- 
stitution we believe these indemonstrable principles to 
be true. Science begins with faith. 

When, in accordance with these inspirations of na- 
ture, science has begun the exploration of the field of 



Spencek's Relativity of Knowledge. 277 

phenomenal facts, the inquiry is never satisfied with the 
verification of existing hypothesis, the attainment of 
positive results. There follows each generalization that 
has been reached the belief that a further interrogation 
of nature will ensue in still higher and broader generali- 
zations, with an increasing approximation to unity with- 
out which the quest of truth cannot be satisfied. It is 
faith in these future realizations that furnishes the 
stimulus to an unremitting investigation of phenomena. 
We push inquiry without fainting, because we have an 
abiding belief that it will conduct to further and grander 
results. As science begins, so it continues, with faith. 
Faith in future achievements is the prophecy of which 
the established conclusions of science are the fulfilment. 
~Not is this all. It cannot be all. The constitution of 
our minds inexorably demands that we go on. The 
unappeasable principle of causality — a "questioning im- 
pulse," as Professor Tyndal interprets it, goads us on 
to the inquiry concerning origins and ends. We may, 
reflectively, but cannot, in fact, effect a schism between 
the one indivisible mind, as scientific, and as philosophi- 
cal. The same man who has pursued a certain line of 
physical investigation, until he has secured a satisfac- 
tory registration of particular facts, and a somewhat 
complete grouping into classes and generalization into 
laws, cannot rest contented at this point. He inevitably 
raises the questions, How? and Why? the answers to 
which are expected to give the causes, efficient and final, 
of universal order and special adaptations. But when, 
under the constraint of this inborn necessity, he crosses 
the boundaries which circumscribe the domain of phe- 



278 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

nomena, he abandons, e concesso, the instruction of per- 
ception and thought. He cannot perceive the unper- 
ceivable, he cannot think the unthinkable. He can 
neither perceive nor think the occult causes behind the 
veil of phenomena. What remains but that he acknow- 
ledge the guidance of faith — the only power which is 
the apocalypse of the unperceivable and incogitable? 
The forces, the power, the causes which by their phe- 
nomenal effects enforce the conviction of their existence 
are not data of consciousness, but postulates of faith. 

So strong, indeed, as well as natural, is this tendency 
to believe that even when the facts of observation do not 
justify the conclusions of thought, it not unfrequently 
happens that scientific investigators themselves hasten 
to accept suppositions and imaginary results as though 
they had been proved, and pronounce established and 
axiomatic certain laws the existence of which may at 
the; same time be mooted in the circles of science. In 
these cases, the disposition to believe is a temptation 
against which it behooves a sober judgment to guard. 
This is not rashly said: a volume might be filled with 
instances in illustration of the fact, 

In the fourth place, the current of philosophical 
thought is more and more setting towards the assertion 
of faith as a cognitive power. 

The emergence into notoriety of the common sense 
philosophy, as a system, has marked decided progress 
in the development of psychology. Appealing to con- 
sciousness as the basis of investigation, and respecting 
the convictions of the race, it treads a safe, middle path 
between the extreme of a transcendental absolutism on 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 279 

the one hand, and that of a sensuistic associationalism 
on the other. One of the great offices which it has dis- 
charged is that it has brought into prominence, empha- 
sized, and at least has begun the systematic develop- 
ment of what its most learned expounder has character- 
ized as "the one perennial doctrine of philosophy" — a 
doctrine which has flowed like an unintermitting stream 
through centuries of fluctuating philosophical opinion 
until it has swelled into the volume of a majestic river. 
The sceptic, like Horace's rustic, has waited on its bank 
to see it dry up, but — 

" Labitur, et labetur in omne volubilis aevum." 

This doctrine is, that there lie at the very foundations 
of the mind as cognitive, original principles, in the 
shape of laws of thought and belief. To this funda- 
mental faculty, this locus principiorum, the roots of 
every cognitive faculty converge, and from it are de- 
rived the life and vigor of them all. These general laws 
become, in relation to each power of cognition, special 
laws determining and regulating its processes — the 
generic regulative principles express themselves in ap- 
plication to the particular cognitive faculties, as specific 
standards in conformity with which the functions of 
each are performed. The representative faculty has its 
own peculiar laws lying at its root and necessitating 
and controlling the evolution of that kind of mediate 
knowledge which belongs to it. So is it with the think- 
ing faculty: the laws of thought regulate its processes. 
And so, also, I must think, is it with a believing faculty, 
the results of which are determined by the laws of belief. 



280 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

That identity, contradiction and excluded middle 
are fundamental laws of thought, few perhaps would 
deny. Why not also admit that space and duration, 
substance and cause are fundamental laws of belief? 
They abide, equally with the laws of thought, the appli- 
cation of the tests of ultimate principles. They are 
absolutely simple, self-evident, and necessary. If one 
must admit that a thing is the same as itself, that a thing 
is not that which is contradictory to it, that of two con- 
tradictories one must be true, the other false, he must 
also admit that objects exist in space, that events occur 
in time, that qualities infer a substance, and that phe- 
nomenal changes are due to causes. But as it is im- 
possible to think space and duration, or to think sub- 
stance and cause, they must be apprehended by belief. 
Apprehend them we most assuredly do. If not by the 
presentative faculty, and consequently not by the re- 
presentative, if not by thought — for how can thought 
transcend the materials furnished by the presentative 
and representative faculties ? — we postulate, we must 
have a power which accounts for the apprehension. 
There is no other which answers the demand but faith. 

Let us take space as an example, concerning the ex- 
istence of which in some way, either as an ens rationis 
or an ens reale, there is no dispute. It is conceded to 
be infinite. Now, either it is purely subjective, or it is 
objective. If subjective, it must in some manner qual- 
ify or modify the subject. But the subject is finite; 
and to affirm an infinite qualification, or modification, 
of a finite subject, would be to speak contradictorily. 
Is space, then, objective? If so, it is an infinite object. 



Spencee's Kelativity of Knowledge. 281 

How, then, is it apprehended by a finite subject? If 
we say that we think it, as to think is to condition, to 
limit, to comprehend, we say that the unconditioned 
is conditioned, the illimitable limited, the incomprehen- 
sible comprehended. Must we then deny all apprehen- 
sion of space? It is, ex hypothesis apprehensible in 
some way. Are we not shut up to the position that we 
apprehend it by faith ? 

It is not intended to say that the laws of belief are 
beliefs any more than to say that the laws of cognition 
are cognitions, or that the laws of thought are thoughts. 
These laws, however, are not mere abstract canons or 
rules; they are tendencies, energetic principles, necessi- 
ties of cognizing, thinking, believing. It is not that we 
may, but we must, cognize, think, believe, in obedience 
to them. 

If, then, there is a faculty by which we think in con- 
formity with the laws of thought, one fails to see why 
there is not a faculty by which we believe in conformity 
with the laws of belief. The latter is as much a faculty 
of cognition as the former. If in actually complying 
with one law of cognition, we know, why not attain 
knowledge when we comply with another? Either the 
beliefs enforced by the laws of belief are delusive, or 
they are not. If delusive, they spring from fundamen- 
tal principles which are deceptive, and our nature is 
radically false. If not, they are trustworthy know- 
ledges. Our beliefs are the products and expressions 
of nature ; they are among the springs of action and the 
guides of life, and if they are not entitled to the de- 
nomination of knowledge, our nature is an organ of de- 



282 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ceit; and as our nature is ourselves, it deceives itself, 
and is an engine of self-destruction. They are not pre- 
sumptions, hypotheses, guesses; they are valid know- 
ledges. It is not a presumption, or an hypothesis, or a 
guess on the part of a man that he was born of his 
mother. He knows it. But he cannot have known it 
by consciousness, or by thought, for thought cannot 
transcend consciousness. How can he know it except by 
faith in her testimony? He knows it by believing it. 
It may be said that it is a necessary inference from her 
acts. Granted ; but her acts and her words are her tes- 
timony, and the inference from it to the fact is a faith- 
inference. Is it not faith that credits testimony ? 

The laws of belief are, upon the conditions of ex- 
perience which are furnished by consciousness, elicited 
from latency, and find expression in special acts — in- 
ferences, convictions, judgments. What are these but 
exercises of faith ? Why, then, refuse to faith the title 
of a faculty, and to its products the denomination of 
cognitions ? It is as much entitled to this honor as is 
thought. 

To this it may be objected that there would be an un- 
necessary multiplication of cognitive faculties. The 
questions then arise, Is it necessary, in any degree, to 
distinguish these faculties ? And if so, is it necessary 
to rank faith as a distinctive faculty ? It is superfluous 
to observe that no distinction of faculties supposes a di- 
vision of the mind, considered essentially. As such it 
is one and indivisible. But with this essential unity 
there consists a distinction of attributes. In the general, 
cognition is not feeling, neither cognition nor feeling is 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 283 

volition. The perception of the distinction between in- 
tellectual truth and intellectual error is not the same 
with that of the distinction between dntj and crime. 
Hence it is legitimate to distribute the generic faculties 
in accordance with peculiar properties which obviously 
differentiate them from each other. So, narrowing the 
view, it is with the cognitive faculty itself. Perception 
is not imagination. In the one case, we immediately 
apprehend objects ; in the other, we represent them. 
Memory represents the past; imagination does more; 
it images the distant, the possible, the future. There 
is consequently a distinction which cannot be refused 
between the representative functions of the memory, 
and some of those belonging to the imagination. Again, 
thought differs from perception and representation. It 
is marked off from them by a peculiar property. The 
usual sub-distribution of these cognitive powers is there- 
fore justifiable, not merely for convenience sake, but be- 
cause grounded in fact. Xow it is evident that faith is 
a cognitive conviction that is different from the product 
of any of the faculties that are usually denominated 
cognitive, and if that be true, the power which pro- 
duces so peculiar a conviction, deserves, on that account, 
to be assigned a distinct and coordinate place among the 
cognitive faculties. 

That there is such a characteristic property belong- 
ing to faith the comman usage of language attests. If 
the demand be pressed for a designation of the differ- 
entiating attribute, I would answer that it is intellectual 
assent, grounded upon testimony. The peculiar convic- 
tion accompanying this assent would seem to be an im- 



284 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

mediate and necessary inference from the testimony 
cognized to the truth of what is testified to. It is some- 
times said that we believe in the existence of an object 
of which we are conscious — that is, of an object imme- 
diately known; and sometimes that we believe in the 
truth of a proposition established by reasoning — that is, 
one mediately known through the comparative process 
of the thinking faculty. And it may be argued that be- 
lief is too wide and ambiguous to constitute a differen- 
tiating property. But a careful analysis may reveal two 
things. First, that this language is not loosely or 
abusively employed; and, secondly, that faith, while a 
particular power, sustains a catholic relation to all our 
cognitive operations. 

When by consciousness we immediately know the 
existence of an object, it is not that at one and the same 
time we directly know it by faith. The knowledge 
through consciousness and the conviction through faith 
are not identical. Faith assents to the testimony of con- 
sciousness, and immediately and necessarily infers the 
fact testified to. It is not its office primarily to give us 
the fact, This is the office of consciousness. But may 
we not be deceived ? The danger is destroyed by our 
believing the testimony of consciousness. 1 If the ques- 
tion be pressed, Why believe that testimony ? The an- 
swer is, that consciousness is the voice of nature, and 
nature the product of God. The testimony of conscious- 

1 1 interpret Dr. Reid to mean this, when he says that we 
believe in the external world as immediately known by Perception. 
We do not directly know it by believing in it. We immediately 
know it by perceiving it. But we have a faith-conviction of the 
truth of the immediate perception. 



Spencer's Kelativity of Knowledge. 285 

ness is the testimony of God. The ultimate ground of 
assent, therefore, is the veracity of God. If our nature, 
in its normal and unperverted condition, deceives us, 
God its author deceives us. From a conclusion so 
shocking all but atheists would recoil. Here we must 
rest. To go further is to raise the question of the di- 
vine existence. 

The same course of reasoning will apply to the con- 
clusions of the thinking faculty in its regular condition. 
It expresses the nature, which reflects the truth of its 
Maker. We believe in its conclusions, not because faith 
actually does the thinking, but because we are so consti- 
tuted that we assent to the testimony of the discursive 
faculty, as, in its just operations, uttering the testimony 
of God. 

The same is also true in regard to memory. I am con- 
strained to accept Sir William Hamilton's exposition of 
its operation as correct. The past event is out of rela- 
tion to consciousness — the faculty of immediate know- 
ledge. We are not conscious of it. But it is repre- 
sented by a mental modification vicarious of it. This 
representation we immediately know by consciousness, 
and mediately know the event itself. Now, what is the 
nature of this mediate knowledge? Why are we con- 
vinced that the event really occurred ? We believe the 
testimony of the ideal representation. So strong is this 
faith that it has sometimes been put into the category 
of intuitive evidence. That is, we entertain a conviction 
of the reality of the past event, analogous to that we ex- 
perience when we have an immediate intuition or per- 
ception of an object. It is this which grounds the sub- 



286 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

jeetive certainty of our own history. And in addition 
to this, it may here be remarked, we believe in our per- 
sonal identity. We know by faith that we at fifty years 
of age are the very same persons who performed cer- 
tain acts at twenty. To say that we are conscious of our 
past personality, or that we immediately know it in 
memory, is to contradict the laws of immediate know- 
ledge. Our conviction of personal identity is an inde- 
structible faith. 

Whether or not we believe in the occurrence of future 
events ideally anticipated by the imagination depends 
upon the question whether they are imagined as merely 
possible or not. If as merely possible, we do not and 
cannot believe in their certain occurrence. If we be- 
lieve, it is on the ground that their occurrence is made 
certain either by the operation of necessary laws or by 
the prophetic declarations of an omniscient Being, im- 
mediately or mediately made. In either case we re- 
pose faith in testimony ; in the former, in the testimony 
of nature, which is indirectly the testimony of its 
author ; in the latter, in the admitted testimony of God, 
verbally imparted. 

The analysis has been pursued far enough to show 
that faith is fundamental and radical, sustaining to the 
operation of all our cognitive powers the relation of an 
ultimate guarantee of their truth. The authority of 
consciousness is final, because believed. The senses are 
treated as veracious witnesses, because believed. The 
representations of memory are relied upon, because be- 
lieved. The processes of the thinking faculty are de- 
pendent on, because believed. Take away faith in the 






Spencee's Kelativity of Knowledge. 287 

operations of our cognitive powers and there would re- 
main no ultimate certitude of human knowledge. Even 
Hume, the desolator, who attempted to abolish all 
human beliefs, believed in the uniformity of nature, 
and the in variableness of antecedence and sequence! 
Without such a faith, to what would his celebrated ar- 
gument against the credibility of miracles amount? 
No; faith is too deeply imbedded in our constitution 
to be cast out. It is nature, and cannot be expelled : 

" Naturam expelles f urea, tamen usque recurret, 
Et mala perrumpet furtim fastidia victrix." 

What has thus far been said has gone to show that 
faith is one of the cognitive powers sustaining a catho- 
lic relation to every other as a voucher for the know- 
ledge which it imparts. Were this the place to sug- 
gest a distribution of the cognitive powers, I would say 
that the reason or intelligence, as the generic faculty of 
cognition, may be distributed specifically into the facul- 
ties of immediate and mediate knowledge. Of the 
former, the presentative faculty — consciousness, as the 
complement of internal and external perception, is the 
exhaustive instance. The faculties of mediate know- 
ledge may be subordinately distributed into the repre- 
sentative, 1 the thinking, and the believing faculties. 

1 The Memory is here included under the denomination, Repre- 
sentative. To this it may be objected that the Conservative Func- 
tion of Memory is not representative. But the question is, What is 
conserved, or retained? The answer must be. I conceive, a repre- 
sentation of the past fact. I hold, with the Scottish School, that 
an external object is perceived, not through an ideal image, but 
immediately. The object, however, when thus intuitively appre- 
hended, strikes an impression of itself upon the mind, by which 



288 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

At the root of each lie the laws peculiar to it: the laws 
of representation, those of thought, and those of belief. 

In the fifth place, the ground may be at least very 
plausibly maintained that in what is called intuitive 
evidence, the immediate inference by which it proceeds 
is one which is drawn, not by thought, but by faith. 
The element of comparison is absent, which is confessed 
to exist as conditioning every conclusion arrived at by 
the thinking faculty. The inference is not made by 
consciousness, or by the imagination, for it is not their 
province to infer. To what power, then, can the imme- 
diate inference which characterizes intuitive evidence be 
referred but faith ? 

In the sixth place, a very large part of human know- 
ledge is derived from testimony — external, objective 
testimony ; and faith is precisely the organ by which it 
is received. This is the very ground of historical know- 
ledge. Remove it, and history is converted into a tissue 
of fables. To say that this is belief and not knowledge 
is to trifle with the subject. The testimony of veracious 
witnesses is a ground of knowledge valid enough to 
justify the hanging of a man. It would be absurd to 
say that the witnesses knew the fact in question, but the 
jury only believed. The fallacy is dissipated by the 

it is represented. This representation is latent beneath conscious- 
ness, until by the operation of certain laws (Suggestion, Associa- 
tion, etc.) it is caused to emerge into consciousness. Either this, 
or Presentative knowledge continues after the presentative rela- 
tion has ceased, and the object presented has vanished from the 
sphere of objective reality — at least, to the human mind; and to 
this difficulty another must be added — namely, that a presentative 
knowledge may exist which is confessedly out of consciousness, 
the presentative faculty. 



Spencek's Relativity of Knowledge. 289 

distinction between immediate and mediate knowledge. 
The witnesses immediately, the jury mediately, knew 
the fact. 

In the seventh place, it may be briefly observed that 
credulity, as the exaggeration and abuse of faith, is at 
the same time its proof, for that which has no existence 
cannot be exaggerated or abused. The philosophical 
skeptic is no more free from credulity than the religious. 
To a group of his officers, whom he overheard talking in 
an infidel strain, the great Napoleon is reported to have 
said, "Gentlemen, there is nothing you will not believe 
but Christianity." And to the agnostics it might be 
said, "Gentlemen, there is nothing you will not believe 
but faith." To deny the existence of faith one would be 
obliged to deny that he believed anything ; for if there 
were anything he believed, he would contradict his 
negation. If it be replied that what has been said only 
serves to prove a feeling of faith and not a cognition, 
the rejoinder is easy, that he who indulges the feeling 
without a rational ground for it, confesses to the weakest 
form of credulity. 

In the eighth place, arguments have been presented, 
up to this point, to show that faith, as to its nature, is 
a cognitive power, entitled to a coordinate place among 
the faculties denominated cognitive, and, as to its office, 
it has been evinced that it acts as a voucher, confirming 
the testimony of the other faculties. I have thus 
endeavored to prove that, in confounding the thinkable 
and the knowable, Mr. Spencer has committed the mis- 
take of restricting knowledge within the confines of the 
thinking faculty ; but to be complete the argument must 



290 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

proceed one step further. It behooves to be shown that 
faith discharges another and a distinctive office — that of 
originating knowledge which it is beyond the competency 
of the other cognitive powers to furnish. They are 
confined, in their operations to the phenomenal sphere. 
This is transparently clear with reference to the pre- 
sentative and representative faculties; but it may be 
doubted whether it holds good of the faculty of thought. 
For example, in those instances in which thought forms 
general notions, in consequence of its power to appre- 
hend abstract truth, it may be supposed that it passes 
beyond the sphere of the phenomenal. A distinction 
is here necessary to be taken : between the products of 
thought alone, which are used in arguments, and the 
products of another power, which are so used ; for there 
are elements in reasoning which are in themselves 
unthinkable, and, therefore, incomprehensible. Where- 
ever notions of space, cause, substance and the infinite 
enter into the composition of arguments, it must be 
remembered that they do not originate in thought. In 
what power they originate, it is the purpose of the 
ensuing argument to show. The man is one and indi- 
visible, and when his knowledge which transcends 
thought is communicated to the thinking faculty, it is 
employed by that faculty symbolically; just as, in an 
equation, x may stand for a number or quantity, which 
it is impossible to think. 

But these abstract notions — what are they ? and how 
are they generated ? Let us take an example. Here is 
a promiscuous collection of white and black men. They 
are separated into two companies, classes, of white men 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 291 

and of black men. What is the principle of division 
and classification ? The resemblance between indi- 
viduals. How is that resemblance grounded ? Upon 
the quality of color — some are white, some are black. 
The quality of color is, we say, abstracted : we form an 
abstract notion of whiteness and of blackness. What is 
the explanation ? The phenomenal quality, white color, 
or black color, is perceived to inhere in a certain indi- 
vidual; another individual is observed to have a like 
phenomenal quality. They are classed together. The 
abstract notion here is simply the apprehension of a 
particular quality which belongs respectively to different 
individuals — a single circumstance with a common rela- 
tion. It is manifest that the sphere of the phenomenal 
has not been overpassed. The same is true of the 
qualities of beauty and ugliness, as determined by the 
laws of the sesthetical faculty; but the case appears to 
be different in regard to the qualities of power, virtue, 
and the like. We perceive their effects in certain indi- 
viduals and are, therefore, able to think the effects ; but 
we cannot perceive power and virtue in themselves. To 
say, then, that we think them is to concede to thought 
the ability to transcend consciousness. What we call 
the abstract notions of power and virtue, are inferences 
from phenomenal effects, and are due to a faculty which 
transcends thought. 

In fine, thought, in its elaborations, its comparisons, 
its judgments, uses the materials supplied by the pre- 
sentative and the representative faculties, and they are 
phenomenal in their character. The elements which 
are constitutive of its processes are concepts, and they 



292 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

are percepts represented, and employed in thought- 
relations. 

What, then, is that power which transcends the phe- 
nomenal sphere, and affirms existence, which thought 
is incompetent to give ? Let us take the apprehension 
of the infinite. That, as an extreme apprehension, 
involving all lower ones of a transcendental character, 
is suited to be a test. Mr. Spencer admits, as we have 
seen, the apprehension of the infinite. Now there are, to 
my mind, but four conceivable suppositions as to the 
way in which it can be apprehended : either, first, by the 
negative protest of thought ; or, secondly, by the imagi- 
nation ; or, thirdly, by what Mr. Spencer terms "indefi- 
nite consciousness' 7 ; or, fourthly, by faith. 

First. The negative protest of thought. By this it is 
meant — if it mean anything, which is very doubtful — 
that thought having, in its nisus, reached the highest 
concept possible to it, denies all limitation of that con- 
cept, and thus in a negative way suggests at least the 
possibility of the infinite. A great writer remarks : 

" It is a saying of the Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite — and it 
has generally been accepted as a sufficient indication of the truth — 
that in ascending from the creature to God we proceed by the 
method of causality, of negation, and of eminence. In the way of 
causality I am constrained to affirm that every perfection which 
is contained in the effect was previously contained in the cause. 
But as the perfections of the creature exist under many limitations 
and conditions which are inconsistent with the notion of the 
Infinite, I am led in the way of negation to remove those restric- 
tions and defects, and to posit the perfections in the abstract. 
Then by the way of eminence I strive to represent these perfec- 
tions as expanded even to infinity. Thought struggles to magnify, 
until it sinks back upon itself exhausted in the effort." 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 293 

Well, one cannot help asking, if it sinks back ex- 
hausted in the struggle to reach the infinite, how, in 
the name of reason, does it ever reach it ? It stops 
infinitely short of it, but in some unaccountable way gets 
to it. There is still another difficulty. All limitation 
is thought away from perfections, and thus unlimited 
they are posited in the abstract. Is not this as near the 
infinite as thought can come ? But this becomes the 
starting point for an exhausting effort to expand the 
perfections to infinity. One is reminded of the frog in 
the fable, who expanded himself until he burst — and 
that was the end of the expanding process. 

This criticism is passed upon the foregoing statement, 
only if it be viewed as describing the way in which 
thought is supposed to reach the infinite. The very first 
step, in the way of causality, 1 is one which the thinking 
faculty could not take, for cause itself cannot be con- 
ceived. It is a datum of faith. If the process is con- 
sidered as one in which thought and faith are co-factors, 
it not unreasonably commended itself to general accept- 
ance. 

The most serious difficulty attending this mode of 
reaching the apprehension of the infinite is that a power 
is ascribed to thought, which it is at the same time 
granted, that it does not possess. The supposition is 
that thought has arrived at the climax of its efforts, that 
it has formed a concept beyond which it can no further 
go. It then denies to that concept all limitation. The 
question arises, What right, what ability, has it to make 
the denial ? It has gone as far as it possibly can, and 

1 Some writers give the way of causality ( via causalitatis ) as 
the last. 



294 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

then goes vastly further ; for the denial of limitation is 
tantamount to the assertion of illimitation — that is, to a 
positive affirmation of infinity. If the challenge be 
made, upon what ground is the negative protest based ? 
the answer must be, Either, there is no ground, and the 
protest being conceded to be groundless, is zero; or, 
there is some ground, and then it is claimed that thought 
has some knowledge beyond its highest and ultimate 
concept, and a contradiction ensues. The right of 
thought to deny limitation upon its ultimate concept is 
not original ; it is borrowed from faith. The statement 
is elliptical; the faith-element is left out. Thought 
stops at a point beyond which it can make no predication 
whatsoever, and faith adds the protest against limita- 
tion. 

Secondly. Imagination. This is easily disposed of. 
Imagination has, indeed, a distant flight, but it cannot 
outsoar its own wing. If finite substance and power 
cannot be imagined, it is certain that infinite cannot; 
and as to the phenomenal universe itself, all that imagi- 
nation can do is to grasp the skirt of the infinite. No 
essence can be imaged, nor can any image compass the 
material universe. Infinitely less can the infinite be 
imaged. 

Thirdly. Indefinite Consciousness. Mr. Spencer's 
doctrine is that we are indefinitely conscious of the 
infinite, and that it is, at the same time, unknowable. 
This is extraordinary. One may use terms in a signifi- 
cation peculiar to himself; but unless Mr. Spencer is 
greatly misunderstood, he employs the term conscious- 
ness in its usual acceptation. He holds that we know 



Spexcep/s Eeeativity of Knowledge. 295 

phenomena by consciousness. He does not even make 
Reid's distinction between consciousness, as the power 
by which we know internal phenomena ; and perception, 
as that by which we know those that are external. ^Now 
it is obvious that there may be a difference of degree in 
the clearness or definiteness of our conscious knowledge 
of phenomenal existences; but it is impossible to see 
how an indefinite consciousness is consistent with the 
total absence of knowledge. Some consciousness, some 
knowledge — this would seem to be incontrovertible. If, 
therefore, we have some consciousness — and an indefi- 
nite consciousness is some consciousness — of the infinite, 
it would follow that we have some knowledge of it. 
How, then, can it be unknowable ? 

Either Mr. Spencer does not limit consciousness to 
the apprehension of the phenomenal, internal and exter- 
nal, or he does. If he does not, he has no right to 
employ the term in a sense which would be utterly para- 
doxical, one in the adoption of which he would break 
with catholic usage. If he does, he is obliged to acknow- 
ledge that the infinite is phenomenal. That would be 
to outrage common sense, and also to contravene his own 
position that the infinite is unknowable precisely because 
it is not phenomenal. Further, if we are indefinitely 
conscious of the infinite, we have an indefinite imme- 
diate knowledge of it, and since immediate knowledge 
conditions thought, we would be able indefinitely to 
think the infinite, and that would contradict Hr. Spen- 
cer's doctrine that it is wholly unthinkable, and, there- 
fore, wholly unknowable. 

If, by indefinite consciousness, Mr. Spencer means 



296 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

belief, he uses his terms not only loosely, but abusively ; 
but, on that supposition, he partially enounces the doc- 
trine contended for in this discussion — only partially, 
it is true, for while he would hold an indefinite belief 
in the infinite, a definite belief in it is here maintained ; 
and while he refuses to call that belief knowledge, it is 
here claimed to be knowledge, not immediate, but, 
although mediate, yet valid, significant, priceless. 

The conclusion is that Mr. Spencer's "indefinite con- 
sciousness'' is incompetent to account for the apprehen- 
sion of the infinite; and yet it must be borne in mind 
that he admits the existence of the infinite, and was, 
therefore, compelled to assign some cause for its appre- 
hension. 1 

Fourthly. Faith. If all the suppositions which are 
possible in the case have been shown to be untenable but 
this one, it is entitled to be accepted as true. It has 
already been evinced that there are at the bottom of our 
mental constitution, considered as cognitive, certain 
fundamental laws of thought and belief, just as there 
are at the root of the feelings laws of taste, of the will 
laws of efficiency and choice, and of the conscience laws 
of morality or rectitude. Some of the laws of belief 
have already been specified, and it is now added that 
among them is the law of belief in the infinite. These 
laws in the first instance — in their connate, primitive 
condition, are latent beneath consciousness, and are 
only elicited into definite, formal expression as actual 

1 In this discussion I have hitherto employed the term appre- 
hension in relation to the infinite, as less ambiguous than notion, 
or idea. It is the most general term that can be used. 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 297 

beliefs, upon the conditions furnished by conscious ex- 
perience. Thev are aptitudes, tendencies, necessities, 
which as laws regulate the processes of the believing 
faculty, and when empirically developed enforce the 
formation of specific beliefs. These beliefs, as cogni- 
tive, as formal knowledges, are justly characterized as 
native notions, for the reason that they are the educts 
of native principles, and not the products merely of 
experience. I proceed to show that the apprehension, 
the cognition, of the infinite, is one of these native 
notions, evolved, through empirical conditions, from 
the fundamental law of belief in the infinite. It is 
original, not derivative. 

In the first place, it is simple and ultimate. It is 
perfectly clear that it is not composite, and, therefore, 
cannot be resolved into anything simpler. Supposing 
the existence of the infinite, it is granted ex vi termini 
that it is one, simple, indivisible. So, likewise, must be 
the notion of the infinite. It is impossible to analyze 
into anything more simple and ultimate either the in- 
finite itself or its apprehension. 

In the second place, it is self-evident. It is certain 
that the notion exists. How, then, did it originate ? 
Manifestly not in any process of thought. The infinite 
is not a percept ; it is not an image ; it is not a concept ; 
it is not proved by reasoning — it is not thought out. It 
is, therefore, autopistic and self-evident ; it reveals itself 
in its own light. 

In the third place, it is characterized by necessity. 

The first proof of this, which I urge, is derived from 
the necessity of believing in space. It is very generally 



298 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

admitted to be infinite. "To set bounds to space," says 
Dr. Samuel Clarke in his answer to Butler's Sixth Let- 
ter, "is to suppose it bounded by something which itself 
takes up space, and that is a contradiction : or else that 
it is bounded by nothing; and then the idea of that 
nothing will still be space, which is another contradic- 
tion." "Space," says Kant, "is represented as an in- 
finite quantity," and Hamilton observes: "We are alto- 
gether unable to conceive space as bounded — as finite; 
that is, as a whole beyond which there is no further 
space." As, then, we cannot deny space, we cannot deny 
the infinite; for if we believe in space as infinite, we 
believe in the infinite, else we believe and do not believe 
in the infinite at the same time. In fine, the necessity of 
believing in space involves the necessity of believing in 
the infinite. The notion of the infinite is, therefore, 
native. 

The same is true of the necessity of believing in dura- 
tion. Like space, it is admitted to be infinite. The 
notion, or faith- judgment, of the infinite, as evolved 
from an original law of belief is necessary, and there- 
fore native. It is a common verbal mistake to coordinate 
space and time.. Space is infinite, and, strictly speaking, 
time is finite. The antithesis is between place and time, 
on the one hand, as being both finite, and space and dura- 
tion, on the other, as being both infinite. We think place 
as a part of space, and time as a part of duration. These 
thought-judgments, derived from conscious experience, 
become the conditions upon which are elicited from laws 
of belief faith- judgments in infinite space and infinite 
duration — in other words, in immensity and eternity. 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 299 

A second proof is drawn from the general prevalence 
of belief in the infinite. 

In the first place, to establish the necessity of this 
belief, it is not requisite to prove its absolute univer- 
sality. It may be conceded that it is not developed 
among certain rude and savage tribes, and it must be 
admitted that in some schools of philosophic and scien- 
tific speculation it has been denied. Investigation into 
the condition of the former more and more, as it pro- 
ceeds, is evincing the fact that in every tribe of men, 
however degraded, there exists a belief in a superior 
power. 1 This constitutes a potential germ from which 
the belief in the infinite is inevitably developed, when- 
ever the affirmation of the infinite is distinctly made. 
Reason and conscience are developed from a condition 
in which at first they seem scarcely to be in existence; 
but it would be mere sophistry to argue that they are not 
connatural elements of the human constitution. In 
regard to the denial of a belief in the infinite by certain 
speculators, it is sufficient to say that the exception 
proves the rule. The acknowledgment of the infinite 
has been imbedded in the theosophies involved in Ori- 
ental religions, in the philosophies of Greece and Rome, 
and pervades the thought of the Christian centuries. It 
deserves to be remarked that the denial of the infinite 
has been made principally by those who were acquainted 
with the Bible and the doctrines of Christianity. For 
this there is a profound reason. Besides the tendency 
of certain minds to throw themselves into opposition to 
accepted dogmas, and even to traverse the general con- 

1 Upon this point, see Mr. Tylor's Primitive Culture. 



300 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

victions of mankind — a contradictoriness which can 
only be accounted for by referring it to pride and the 
love of reputation — it cannot be overlooked that the 
admission of the infinite by one who knows the Bible 
and Christianity would carry with it the admission of 
an infinite lawgiver, ruler and judge, and of the inflic- 
tion of punishment upon the transgressors of his law. 
Neither his father nor himself, John Stuart Mill in- 
forms us, was a dogmatic atheist. The God, whose 
existence they denied, was one of retributive justice. 
This fact speaks volumes. It is typical and representa- 
tive. Take away infinite justice and eternal retribution, 
and it is more than likely that not only would denial of 
the infinite cease, but skepticism in regard to the exist- 
ence of an infinite God. Why not ? A key to the per- 
plexing problems of the universe would be found, and 
men would hasten to place themselves under the pro- 
tecting wing of boundless philanthropy and power ; but 
whatever may be thought of this, the class who deny the 
infinite are numerically too insignificant to be taken 
into account in an estimate of the convictions of the 
human race. Mr. Spencer himself, the great exponent 
of the current .agnostic philosophy, does not belong to 
that class — he admits the infinite. 

In the second place, the well-nigh universal employ- 
ment of the term infinite argues the necessity of a belief 
in its existence. Either this, or the term is an unmean- 
ing cipher, and the language in which it is used is mere 
jargon. Words symbolize things: this word must, 
therefore, signify something. Nor will it do to say that 
nothing more is meant than the indefinite ; for language 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 301 

itself notes a distinction between the indefinite and the 
infinite — that is, to be more explicit, between the un- 
limited and the illimitable, between that which is not 
limited and that which cannot be limited. In addition 
to this, it may be doubted whether thought alone can 
give the indefinite, whether it does not always give only 
the definite. If so, it is the province of faith to give 
both the indefinite and the infinite. 

In the third place, the terms finite and infinite are 
correlatives. Granted the validity of the one, that of the 
other is conceded. Hamilton, in his Critique of Cou- 
sins Philosophy, denies the justness of this position. 
He contends that the reality of the finite does not involve 
the reality of the infinite. As one of these terms is, in 
thought, the negation of the other, instead of the reality 
of the infinite being suggested, it may be denied. The 
correlation does not necessitate "correality" ; but this 
only holds good when the terms are used in regard to 
the same thing. It would be a contradiction to say that 
the same thing is finite and infinite; but there is no 
contradiction when, of different things, it is affirmed, 
that one is finite and the other infinite. 

In the next place, even in the sphere of thought cor- 
relatives involving a negation of one of the members do 
not always suppose the non-existence of the member to 
which the negative is attached. Socrates as husband, 
and Xanthippe as wife are correlatives; but to affirm 
that Socrates was not Xanthippe would certainly not be 
to deny the existence of the latter. It is clear that even 
the negation would suppose her existence. Further, of 
the correlatives finite and infinite, one member of the 



302 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

relation is supplied by thought, the other by faith. 
Hamilton was right in asserting, against Cousin, that 
the concept finite does not suggest or imply the concept 
infinite; but he was, to my mind, wrong in not admit- 
ting that the concept finite is the correlative of the faith- 
notion infinite, and that the reality of the finite involves 
the reality of the infinite. Had he done this he would 
have carried out his own doctrine touching the mode in 
which we know the infinite — namely, mediately by 
faith. Cousin was wrong in maintaining that in think- 
ing the finite we think the infinite. He would have 
been right had he held that the finite as thought sug- 
gests the infinite as believed. 

These considerations are sufficient to show that the 
cognition of the infinite is a native notion, elicited by 
the conditions of experience from an original and funda- 
mental law of belief. 

It is not necessary to the purpose of this particular 
discussion to go further, and evince the existence of 
fundamental laws of belief, enforcing a special faith 
in an infinite being, who is a person and a cause; 
although that, I conceive, might be done. All that the 
argument in hand demanded was the establishment of 
such a law and such a faith in relation to the infinite, 
for the reason that it was designed to disprove the asser- 
tion of Mr. Spencer that the infinite, as being out of 
relation to our cognitive faculties, is unknowable. 

In the last place, the argumentum ad hominem may 
be still further pressed against Mr. Spencer, on the 
ground of his admission that the forces of nature are 
knowable. Science claims to be knowledge, as the very 



Spencer's Relativity of Knowledge. 303 

etymology of the term implies; but the scientific man 
does not limit his knowledge to the mere phenomenal 
facts, cognized by sense-perception. How, then, does he 
know occult force which is beyond the reach of percep- 
tion and reveals itself only by phenomenal, perceivable 
effects ? If he says that he does not know it, he admits 
his ignorance of gravity, electricity, magnetism and 
chemical affinity ; he would abdicate the seat of science. 
If he says that he does know it, although unperceivable 
and therefore unthinkable, he gives up his position ; for 
if we may know any force, albeit not a datum of thought, 
we may know infinite force. ISTor can Mr. Spencer 
refuse the inference, inasmuch as he reduces all special 
forces to unity upon a universal force, which he desig- 
nates as an infinite and eternal energy." 

The argument must here close. It has been shown 
that, though the infinite, as such, is out of relation to 
thought, it is in relation to faith; and as it has been 
proved that faith is one of the cognitive powers of the 
human mind, the infinite is knowable. 

What remains to be said must be remitted to a discus- 
sion in general of the doctrine of agnosticism. 



THE ARGUMENT FOR THE BEING OF 
GOD FROM OUR COGNITIVE NA- 
TURE. 



IT is one of the most amazing features of the his- 
tory of our race that the question in regard to the 
fact of God's existence should ever have been raised. It 
is a mournful proof of the folly and impiety to which 
sin has reduced mankind. One feels like making an 
apology beforehand for discussing the question. Yet 
it is conceivable that unf alien intelligences would take 
delight in reflectively demonstrating the spontaneous 
faith in God's existence, which is the necessary product 
of their nature. And, further, the question is forced 
upon us in our fallen condition in consequence of the 
denial of the divine existence by the atheist, and of the 
competency of its proofs by the positivist and the ag- 
nostic. 

The view of the argument is just, which some writers 
propound, that it is not so much a demonstration of 
the divine existence as originally a doubtful and de- 
batable fact, as it is an exposition and defence of our 
spontaneous faith in the fact; or rather, that it is the 
reflective construction of the spontaneous processes by 
which the native tendency to believe in the divine ex- 
istence is developed into actual faith. It is, from this 
point of view, vindicated against the position, main- 
tained by some, that it is gratuitous, if not irreverent. 



Akgumk^tt foe the Being of God. 305 

The argument, in its completeness, involves proofs 
from every source — from the whole world within us 
and the whole world without us. Everything has a 
tongue that proclaims the being of God, and the union 
of these tongues makes a chorus of unbroken and perfect 
harmony. The result is a mighty testimony of con- 
current witnesses combined into indivisible unity. 

The chief purpose of these remarks is to show that 
the a priori and the a posteriori arguments constitute 
one joint and inseparable argument for the existence of 
God. They are complementary to each other, inter- 
dependent and incapable of disjunction. The argu- 
ment for one God behooves to be itself one. The proofs, 
like globules of quicksilver running into one mass, or 
tributaries emptying into a great river, flow together 
and coalesce in one powerful demonstration. 

It is not unusual to state these arguments, a priori 
and a posteriori, as each possessed of individual com- 
pleteness. This occasions the discussion of each upon 
its own separate merits, and the result has been to im- 
peach the validity of each. This is especially evinced 
in the tendency so common in recent times to discredit 
what is called the a priori or ontological argument. It 
is said that Kant gave it its death-blow. This is the 
consequence of confusion in the estimation of the force 
of the whole argument for the divine existence. Each 
line of proof, the a priori and the a posteriori, is sound 
and tenable up to its measure. There are two extremes 
to be avoided. One is to consider each, by itself, as suf- 
ficient and conclusive ; the other, to regard the a priori 
element as possessed of no force in the general con- 



306 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

struction of the argument. The truth is, that each 
brings its own valuable contribution to the whole demon- 
stration ; each is absolutely indispensable to the develop- 
ment of the other, and both in conjunction to the in- 
tegrity of the argument. In a word, they are not two 
arguments; they are but one. It cannot be too fre- 
quently or too urgently insisted upon that the judg- 
ments of thought and those of faith combine in the 
structure of the proof as a whole. 

There are two statements of the import of these ar- 
guments, neither of which lies beyond criticism. The 
first is, that the argument a priori is one from cause to 
effect ; the argument a priori is one from effect to cause. 
The second is, that the former is one from our funda- 
mental intuitions ; the latter is from effect to cause. 

The first of these statements is at once attractive and 
deceptive on account of the apparently accurate anti- 
thesis which it presents. One member exactly matches 
the other. There is simply an inversion of order, first 
from cause to effect, then from effect to cause. But it 
is too narrow in both members. The argument a priori 
is not confined to one fundamental law of our constitu- 
tion ; it is derived from many of its fundamental laws. 
The argument a posteriori is not alone from effect to 
cause, but from the conditions of experience, whatever 
they may be, upon which our fundamental laws are de- 
veloped into formal expression — so far as they are re- 
lated to the subject of the divine existence. The argu- 
ment is not merely from effects, but, in the general, 
from phenomenal facts. 

The second of these statements is not liable to the 



Akgument foe the Beijstg of God. 307 

charge of being too narrow in respect to its first member. 
It correctly represents the argument as derived from our 
fundamental laws. It is open to objection, however, in 
regard to that first member, in that it characterizes those 
laws as intuitions. The term intuitions is too ambiguous 
to be employed in a statement so sharply formal. It is 
very often used to signify the perceptions of objects 
presentatively given. The meaning, as here used, is 
that of fundamental laws of our mental constitution, 
and that phraseology or one equivalent to it should be 
adopted. The second member, namely, that the a 'pos- 
teriori argument is from effect to cause, is liable to the 
criticism passed upon the second member of the first 
statement. It is too narrow. This can be easily illus- 
trated. We have a fundamental law of belief in sub- 
stance and property. If now, reasoning merely from 
effect to cause, we legitimately attain to the First 
Cause, the process is inadequate. We must also con- 
clude from property to substance in favor of a First 
Substance. The two sorts of argument, as complemen- 
tary to each other, are necessary to give us the First 
Substance, who is the First Cause. Other illustrations 
of the same thing will be supplied in the development 
of the argument. 

The statement, as I conceive, ought to be: The argu- 
ment for the existence of God is derived from the funda- 
mental laws of our constitution in connection with the 
facts of experience. 

Here each element, the a priori and the a posteriori, 
is given, but in its due proportion and under its neces- 
sary limitatidfis. Particularly let it be noticed that 



308 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

there is no denial of the a priori element as a constituent 
of the argument as a whole. On the contrary, its force 
is admitted, under proper restrictions. Indeed, it is 
conceded to be the basis of the argument, but it cannot 
complete it without the conditions of conscious obser- 
vation. Both elements go to constitute the totality of 
the argument, to bring it into the unity of one great 
whole' — a finished demonstration. 

The order of these respective elements is : the funda- 
mental laws, or pure a priori principles, are first as to 
existence, but out of consciousness ; the conditions of 
experience, the a posteriori elements, are second in the 
order of existence, but first in consciousness ; then there 
follow, thirdly, conscious faith-judgments, formally ex- 
pressing the fundamental laws as developed upon em- 
pirical conditions. I proceed to consider — 

The Argument feom our Cognitive Nature. 
1. First in order comes the fundamental law of ex- 
istence. It can hardly be disputed that there is such a 
law : an aptitude, tendency, necessity, constitutional pre- 
disposition, to believe in existence, and to affirm it. 
This emerges, into consciousness upon conditions of ex- 
perience. We perceive, or are conscious of, the effects 
of existence, and by an immediate and necessary in- 
ference we form a faith-judgment in existence itself. 
The question of the kind of existence is determined by 
other laws as developed from latency by experience. 
For instance, the famous aphorism of Descartes, Cogito, 
ergo sum, although brief, is easily separable into two 
parts. First, from thought, as a phenomenal fact de- 



Argument for the Being of God. 309 

livered by consciousness, the inference is immediate 
and necessary to a thinking subject which exists. 
Secondly, the judgment that this thinking subject is I 
depends on another law, that of personality. Since the 
phenomenon of thought is subjective, it is necessarily 
inferred, in accordance with that law, that it is myself 
that is the subject phenomenally manifested. The two 
inferences are practically inseparable, but they may be 
reflectively disjoined. So with many of our formal 
judgments. 

This fundamental law of existence is in itself incap- 
able of conducting us to God, but it is the starting point 
of the process which does. We must begin with it. 
Howe and Clarke commence their arguments with the 
assumption that something now exists. The arguments 
of Anselm, Descartes, Leibnitz, and Cousin start with 
the same indispensable assumption. 

2. The argument from the fundamental law of causal- 
ity to a First Cause. Whether this be a fundamental 
law of belief is a question which cannot here be con- 
sidered. I have discussed it in a criticism of Sir W. 
Hamilton's theory of causation. ^N"or can the question 
whether the relation of cause and effect be one involv- 
ing production or merely one of antecedence and se- 
quence be now undertaken. It is assumed, in accordance 
with the convictions of the race, that cause implies pro- 
ducing power. 

As soon as the law of causality begins to be elicited 
into expression by conscious experience we begin to 
form the faith- judgments : that every perceivable ex- 
istence, and every change which occurs, must have had 



310 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

a cause. This argument from cause may be presented 
in two forms : 

(1.) From the contingency and changeableness of 
the world to a necessary First Cause. That the parts 
of the world are contingent and changeable is proved by 
consciousness and observation. What is true of all the 
parts is true of the whole. Whatsoever is contingent 
and changeable began. If the world began, it had a 
cause which began it. This cause must have been either 
in itself or out of itself. If in itself, the world sponta- 
neously began. This is out of the question. The cause 
must therefore have been out of itself. This cause 
must have necessary existence. Were it contingent, we 
would have the same regression in quest of a necessary 
being which was its cause. But a regression of the 
contingent to infinity is self-contradictory. We attain 
to a necessary First Cause of the world. There are 
specious objections urged against the validity of this 
argument. 

First. The position is challenged that there is con- 
clusive proof of the contingency and changeableness of 
the world. It is contended that while the phenomenal 
manifestations of matter are contingent and changeable, 
its substance is not. Substantially considered, matter 
is eternal. But matter cannot be eternal, for — 

In the first place, it is not infinite. It is certain that 
some mater is finite. If so, no matter can be infinite, 
since we would have infinite matter plus finite, which 
is a contradiction. 

In the second place, if matter is not infinite, it can- 
not be eteranl, for only that which is infinite can be 



Argument foe the Being of God. 311 

eternal. If it be said that matter may be infinite in one 
respect, namely, duration, without being infinite in all 
respects ; the answer is, that this involves an absurdity, 
for matter would be partly infinite and partly finite. 
That is contradictory to our apprehension of infinity as 
a perfect and indivisible totality. 

In the third place, if matter is characterized by ex- 
tension, it is divisible into parts. But what is predicable 
of all the parts is predicable of the whole. As, on the 
supposition, all the parts limit and condition each 
other, the whole must be limited and conditioned ; that 
is, must be finite. All matter is finite. We reach again 
the conclusion that matter, being finite, cannot be eter- 
nal. 

In the fourth place, if matter be eternal, it is, as has 
been shown, infinite. Eternity is embraced in the no- 
tion of infinity. If infinite, it is necessary. It must 
ever be what it was. It could not change in form, for 
the infinite has no form. Form implies limitation. 
But matter does change in form, that is incontro- 
vertible. Therefore it cannot be infinite, and hence can- 
not be eternal. 

In the fifth place, if, as has been proved, that matter 
is finite, it began. If that be denied, it is affirmed that 
matter is infinite in duration, which is contrary to the 
supposition that it is finite. If it began, it cannot be 
eternal, for the very definition of an eternal thing is, 
that it had no beginning and will have no end. 

If matter is not eternal, the conclusion remains im- 
pregnable, that as it is contingent and changeable, it 
must have a cause which is necessary. 



312 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

Secondly. It is objected by Herbert Spencer that the 
conception of self-existence and of a First Canse leads 
to insoluble contradictions. We cannot conceive them, 
and, consequently, cannot know them. "Respecting the 
origin of the universe/' he remarks, "three verbally in- 
telligent suppositions may be made. We may assert that 
it is self -existent, or that it is self-created, or that it is 
created by an external agency. Which of these supposi- 
tions is most credible it is not needful here to inquire. 
The deeper question into which this finally merges is, 
whether any one of them is even conceivable in the true 
sense of the word." 1 

In the first place, Mr. Spencer is extravagantly wrong 
in subordinating credibility to conceivability ; in rep- 
resenting it as impossible for us to believe what we can- 
not conceive. In answer it would be sufficient to say 
that upon this ground we could not believe in the ex- 
istence of the universe about the origin of which this 
question is concerned, for it is perfectly certain that no 
human mind can conceive it. The whole question would 
be non-existent, for the universe itself would be out of 
relation to our faculties, and, therefore, to us non-ex- 
istent, Mr. Spencer, no doubt, believes in the origin of 
life, but can he conceive it ? If he can, he would be bet- 
ter entitled than was Raymond Lully to the honor of 
being styled Doctor Illuminatus. We are environed by 
numerous facts which we must believe, although it is 
only their phenomenal manifestations which we can 
conceive. 

Mr. Spencer cites Sir W. Hamilton, and quotes 

1 First Principles, p. 30, New York Ed. 



Argument foe the Being of God. 313 

largely from Dr. Mansel, in support of his views. He 
misconceived them. The former expressly asserts that 
we are compelled to believe much that we cannot con- 
ceive, and the latter, in his Limits of Religious Thought, 
did not intend to impugn the transcendental faiths of 
Theism and Christianity. His argument was aimed at 
the processes of the absolutist philosophy. Its defect 
consisted in not emphasizing the positive office of faith, 
and thus exposing itself to misconstruction. 

Mr. Spencer is right in holding that we cannot con- 
ceive self -existence and a First Cause, and utterly wrong 
in concluding that, therefore, we cannot believe in them. 
The truth is, that while we cannot think them, for the 
tether of thought is short, we are compelled by the laws 
of our constitution to believe in them. This is even true 
of existence and cause, let alone self-existence and a 
first cause. 

In the second place, Mr. Spencer, in explanation of 
the universe, affirms "an infinite and eternal energy." 
Kow it is obvious that this necessarily infers both self- 
existence and a first cause : self-existence for that which 
is infinite and eternal, is e concesso, uncaused; a first 
cause, for if there be any cause, an infinite and eternal 
energy could have had no cause before it. Although he 
contradicts his theory of knowledge, Mr. Spencer is 
right in affirming an infinite and eternal energy; he is 
unphilosophical in stopping here, in not going on ex- 
plicitly to affirm a being to whom this infinite and 
eternal energy belongs ; for such a being is implicitly 
suggested by the affirmation — is necessarily inferrible 
from it. 



314 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

Thirdly. Kant, in order to discredit the cosinological 
proof of God's existence, offered this objection: If it 
be maintained that the principle of causality demands a 
cause for every new appearance, or, in general, for 
everything that exists, the same principle would exact 
a cause for God's existence; and if it be replied that 
his existence is uncaused, then the same may be true of 
the existence of the universe ; but, briefly — 

In the first place, Kant's inference that the world may 
he uncaused is met by the positive proof that it is caused. 
whatever view may be held as to God, it is certain that 
the world was caused. 

In the second place, if the world were uncaused, it 
must either have begun spontaneously, or it is infinite. 
The hypothesis of spontaneous generation must be 
thrown out of account. ~No one now fathers it. If 
infinite, we have two infinite substances, and that 
implies one infinite substance too many. Two would 
condition each other, and, therefore, neither could be 
infinite; which is contrary to the supposition. If the 
universe be uncaused, God is contained in it, unless the 
wild dream be entertained that there can be two un- 
caused substances. If contained in it, he is either finite 
or infinite. If finite, he is not God. If infinite, one 
infinite substance is contained in another infinite sub- 
stance, which is harder to believe than that one incom- 
pressible atom of matter is contained in another. 

In the third place, one finds it difficult to conceive — 
as has often been remarked — why, if we may infer an 
infinite moral ruler from the fundamental facts of our 
moral nature, we may not equally infer an infinite 



ARGUMENT FOE THE BEING OF GoD. 315 

maker from the fundamental law of causation in our 
intellectual. The great assertor of transcendental ideas 
was certainly inconsistent with himself. A rigorous 
subjectivity ought to have excluded every objective 
existence, or it ought not to have been maintained at all. 

(2.) Another form in which the argument may be 
stated is from the finiteness of the world to a first cause. 
That is finite which is limited and conditioned. All 
human spirits are limited and conditioned, therefore 
finite. This is the indubitable testimony of conscious- 
ness. Matter is finite. It is divisible into parts. These 
parts limit and condition each other. Granted the 
existence of indivisible atoms ; these atoms limit and 
condition each other. What is predicable of all the parts 
is predicable of the whole. Matter as a whole is, there- 
fore, finite. The world, consisting of spirit and 
matter, is, consequently, finite. 

If the world is finite, it began. If it began, it must 
either have spontaneously began, or have been begun by 
a cause outside of and antecedent to itself. The former 
supposition is inadmissible; the latter, therefore, is 
true. We reach a first cause of the world. 

There are only two objections to his argument which 
appear to me to deserve consideration. 

First. It has been objected that while the finiteness 
of a single series cannot be denied, the supposition of 
an infinite series of series involves no contradiction. 
The following argument has been supposed possible in 
support of this extraordinary position: a Is a past 
eternity any more impossible to be made up of the 
addition of an infinite number of finite parts than an 



316 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

abstract infinite future ? Surely not. !Now there is to 
be just such an infinite future: namely, your and my 
immortality, which, although it may not be measured 
by solar days and years, will undoubtedly be composed 
of parts of successive time infinitely multiplied ; but to 
this future eternity, it would be exactly parallel to 
object that we make each link in it have an end, while 
the whole is endless; which would involve the same 
absurdity, of a chain extended forward after the last 
link was ended. The answer again is : there is no last 
link, the number thereof being infinite. In a word, what 
mathematician does not know that infinitude may be 
generated by the addition of finites repeated an infinite 
number of times V 9 

In reply, it is enough to say that the terms used are 
utterly misleading. Throughout the indefinite is put 
for the infinite, although between them there is an 
infinite difference. There can be, strictly speaking, no 
"past eternity." The distinction verbally made between 
a past and a future eternity is a mere thought-distinction 
to aid our feeble faculties. Faith affirms an eternity 
which is a perfect, indivisible unity. An "infinite 
number" is an impossibility. The infinite and number 
are incongruous apprehensions. Numbers of finites 
may be indefinitely multiplied, but there must ever be 
an infinite want of approximation to the infinite. There 
cannot be "an infinite future" : not to God, for with 
him, strictly speaking, there is no past and no future; — 
he is; not to finite beings, for, although immortal, they 
are not eternal. Project immortality indefinitely, and 
between it and eternity there must be an infinite chasm. 



Akgument foe the Being oe God. 317 

The very fact of progressiveness excludes eternity. 
"That infinitude may be generated by the addition of 
finites repeated an infinite number of times" may be 
mathematically correct, for the simple reason that the 
infinite of the mathematician is not the infinite of the 
metaphysician. It is the indefinite of thought. The 
very terms generation of infinity would be absurd ; and 
so the terms infinite series and infinite series of series 
symbolize no idea. They are mere words "signifying 
nothing." As well talk of a triangular, pink, raw-edged 
infinite ! 

Secondly. It may be objected, with some plausibility, 
that God being admitted, matter may be infinite, for it 
would not displace him. This is true of the material 
universe as now existing. The theist holds that he is 
present at every point of it, that he knows its every 
atom. If God now co-exists with matter without being 
displaced, why not eternally? If with finite matter, 
why not with infinite ? Infinite matter would no more 
conflict with his being or attributes than does finite. 

In the first place, this is a mere hypothesis ; but it 
has been shown by positive proofs that matter is finite. 
Facts cannot be met by the supposition of a possi- 
bility. 

In the second place, according to the supposition, 
matter would be uncaused, and, therefore, self-existent 
and independent of God. This supposes a limitation 
upon his power ; which is contrary to the admission of 
his infinity; for — 

His power to create would be limited. He could not 
create anything material, for, on the supposition, matter 



318 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

would be infinite, and incapable of addition. All matter 
being infinite, it would have no parts to be created. It 
may be said that this would not limit his power consid- 
ered as potentiality. That might be, but it is clear that 
the exercise of his power would be limited. It could 
only be exercised in creating spirits. 

His power to annihilate would be limited. He could 
not, without a contradiction, be supposed to annihilate 
the infinite and self -existent ; and as matter, according 
to the supposition of its infinity, would be indivisible 
into parts, he could annihilate no part of matter. 

His power to control matter would be limited, indeed 
destroyed ; for it would be contradictory to suppose that 
what is infinite and self -existent could be subject to 
control. 

His power would be limited by the necessity under 
which he would lie to conform to the laws of matter. 
Unoriginated by him, and independent of him, he could 
only work in the material system by obeying its laws ; 
all of which is contradictory to the admission that he is 
an infinite God. 

Two considerations may be added which go to prove 
that matter cannot be infinite. 

One is that spirits are conscious of finiteness, and as 
spirit is greater than matter, a fortiori, matter cannot 
be infinite. If to this the materialist reply that spirit is 
but matter, so much the worse for his case; for the 
spirit is certainly conscious of finiteness, and it would 
follow that some matter is finite, and, therefore, none 
could be infinite; and, further, if the better part of 
matter is finite, much more the inferior. 



Aegumeistt foe the Being of God. 319 

Another consideration is that were matter infinite, it 
would have the power of self-motion ; bnt some matter, 
confessedly, has not. Therefore, if some has, and some 
has not, self-motion, it wonld follow that the infinite is 
partly self -moved and partly not; which is contradic- 
tory to the nature of the infinite. 

The position of the pantheist, so far as it may be 
related to this argument, will not be examined here. It 
has been considered in a separate discussion. 1 

2. The argument from the fundamental law of sub- 
stance to a first substance. 

So far the argument has validly conducted us to a 
necessary first cause ; but it may be contended, as Her- 
bert Spencer does contend, that this first cause is only a 
force or energy. The purpose of this branch of the 
argument is to show that the first cause is also the first 
substance. 

Sir W. Hamilton, in excepting causality from the 
category of fundamental, original, under ived principles, 
also excepted substance from that category. He has not, 
however, in regard to the judgment touching substance, 
developed his views as he did with reference to the 
causal judgment. We may reasonably conjecture that 
his method of argument was the same in both cases. As 
he ascribed the judgment as to cause to a negative neces- 
sity arising from a mental powerlessness not to admit 
causes when we perceive phenomenal changes, so, no 
doubt, he attributed the judgment as to substance to an 
analogous mental impotence not to affirm substances 
when we cognize properties. But what real and im- 

1 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 



320 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

portant difference is there between the results of the two 
kinds of necessity — the negative and the positive? To 
say that we cannot hut admit, is practically all one with 
saying that we must admit. To maintain that we cannot 
but affirm cause, we cannot but affirm substance, is 
tantamount to maintaining that we must affirm both. 
Without the repetition here of discussion in relation 
to this point, the present argument will begin with the 
assumption that there is in our mental constitution a 
fundamental, original, underived law or principle neces- 
sitating the judgment of substance, when properties are 
empirically apprehended. 

Phenomena being perceived, we necessarily infer the 
substances which they manifest. This is done in one of 
two ways: immediately or mediately. Certain phe- 
nomenal manifestations we consider as properties, and 
immediately conclude from them to substance — as from 
divisibility to the substance which is divisible. Other 
phenomena we contemplate as effects, and while we im- 
mediately infer some causal power, we mediately 
through power as a property, infer substance to which 
power as a property belongs. From power to substance 
the inference, is immediate, but from the phenomena 
perceived we mediately infer through power the sub- 
stance to which as a property it pertains. 

Just here it is proper to remark that needless confu- 
sion results from the attempt to distinguish, as sharply 
as has been done, between power, force and energy. 
That question will not now be raised. It is immaterial 
to the present argument. If it be granted that there 
are powers, forces, energies, which inhere in this finite 



Argument foe the Being of God. 321 

system, and which manifest themselves to observation 
by their phenomenal effects, we necessarily refer them 
to the natural substances to which they belong as proper- 
ties. The inference is legitimate to the existence of 
these substances; but these substances, with their fur- 
niture of powers, forces, energies, we must refer to a 
first causal power which produced them. The world 
itself, as has been shown by the preceding argument 
from causality, must be ascribed to this primordial 
causal power. We are, then, compelled, by the law of 
substance and property, to infer from this first causal 
power a first substance, to which, as an attribute, it 
belongs. To no lower substance can it be assigned, since 
every other substance was produced by the first cause. 
It would be absurd to make the producing power an 
attribute of a thing produced by it. We have been con- 
ducted by the fundamental law of cause and effect to a 
first cause. We are now conducted by the equally funda- 
mental law of substance and property to a first sub- 
stance, as being the first cause. We are led to no merely 
abstract power, or force, or energy. 

3. The argument from the law of personality to the 
personality of the first substance. 

It is not necessary to this argument to indicate the 
way in which the conviction of our personality arises, 
whether the testimony of consciousness immediately 
affirms the fact, or whether a fundamental law of belief, 
developed upon the conditions furnished by the con- 
sciousness of our internal phenomena, enforces imme- 
diately, necessarily and with inconceivable swiftness the 
inference to the fact. We are indubitably convinced 



322 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

that we are persons. This is true of all human 
beings. 

The question then occurs, What account can be given 
of the fact ? How came we to be persons ? The old 
Greek hypothesis of man's autochthonous origin will 
scarcely be maintained. If we take the path of cause 
and effect, we demand of the Spencerian evolutionist, 
who affirms an impersonal first cause, how the effect 
comes to contain more than the cause which produced 
it — to possess an element which was not virtually or 
potentially in its cause. How came an impersonal cause 
to produce a personal effect % If he reply that the theist 
is pressed by the same kind of difficulty, for, How came 
a spiritual cause to produce a material effect % the rejoin- 
der is, briefly, that the theist affirms a free Creator. 
Acting freely and not necessarily, he caused some being 
not analogous to his own. If he could not have done this 
he would not have been omnipotent. This is one thing ; 
but it is another to say that a cause, acting in conformity 
to a rigid necessity, could have produced an effect out of 
all analogy to itself. 

If we take the path of substance and property, we 
demand of the. pantheist, who affirms an impersonal first 
substance, how the thing evolved comes to contain an 
element which was not potentially involved in the 
evolver — an evolver developing in accordance with a 
law of blind, immanent necessity. It will not answer to 
say that the principle of development was that of pro- 
gression. 1 That would sacrifice the law of evolution, a 
law vital to the theory of the pantheist. 

1 Prof. Sully, in the Encyclopaedia Britannica: On Evolution. 



Argument foe the Being of God. 323 

If, then, we were caused by a first substance, we are 
entitled, we are necessitated, to believe that that sub- 
stance is personal. E"o other just account can be given 
of our own personality. 

It is added that, granted the personality, then, also, 
the intelligence, affections, will and moral nature, of the 
first substance are admitted. Not that it is intended to 
say that these are constituent elements of personality; 
not at all. The belief in personality is as simple and 
unresolvable, as it is self-evident and necessary; but 
intelligence, feelings, will, and moral qualities, if we 
may judge from the analogy of our own being, are as 
constituent elements of the nature, the essence, sponta- 
neous conditions upon which the person acts. On the 
one hand, wherever these conditions exist, they demand 
personality, and, on the other hand, wherever there is 
personality, it requires these conditions of its activity. 
In a word, the first substance is not only the first cause, 
but a personal spirit. 

4. The argument from the fundamental law of belief 
in the infinite to the infinity of the substantive, personal, 
first cause. 

Let it be borne in mind that by such a fundamental 
law of belief is intended, not a formal faith- judgment 
that the infinite is, but a constitutional aptitude, pre- 
disposition, tendency, necessity, which, when developed 
upon the conditions of conscious experience, leads to 
such a formal faith- judgment : enforces the positive 
affirmation of the infinite. As the alleged fact of such 
a law will, no doubt, be disputed, some of the reasons 
will be stated which constrain belief in its existence. 



324 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

(1.) The first proof will be derived from the necessity 
of belief in space. Space is well-nigh universally ad- 
mitted to be infinite; but if we necessarily believe in 
space, and believe it to be infinite, we believe in the 
infinite. If not, we believe and do not believe in the 
infinite at the same time; which is a manifest contra- 
diction. In fine, the necessity of believing in space 
involves the necessity of believing in the infinite. The 
same kind of argument is derivable from the necessity 
of believing in duration. Like space it is admitted to 
be infinite. Place and time are, strictly speaking, 
thought-judgments springing from conscious experience, 
and they become the conditions upon which are elicited 
from laws of belief faith- judgments in infinite space and 
infinite duration. Grant the necessity of believing in 
infinite space and duration, you grant the necessity of 
believing in the infinite. 

(2.) A second proof is drawn from the almost uni- 
versal prevalence of a belief in the infinite among man- 
kind, evincing a fundamental tendency to the formation 
of that belief. 

First. This again is proved by the universal tendency 
to belief in the- infinity of space. 

Secondly. It is also proved by the universal tendency 
to belief in a superior power. This is conceded by 
Herbert Spencer himself. This tendency, when devel- 
oped upon the conditions of experience, takes formal 
shape in the faith-judgment, which affirms an infinite 
power. 

Thirdly. It makes no difference that the tendency to 
believe in the infinite may not be developed among cer- 



Argument for the Being of God. 325 

tain savage tribes, or in densely ignorant persons in 
civilized communities. Reason, conscience, taste, may 
be undeveloped, but it would be utterly sophistical to 
infer from that fact that there is no reason, or con- 
science, or taste capable of being developed. How could 
that be developed which did not exist ? Education sup- 
poses an original power susceptible of being educated. 

Nor does it make any difference that the infinite is 
denied by some on speculative grounds. These excep- 
tions serve but to call attention to the rule. They no 
more affect the general belief of the race than would a 
few drops of ink the ocean into which they might be 
infused. 

Fourthly. The Avell-nigh universal employment of 
the word infinite argues the necessity of believing in its 
existence. Either this, or the term is meaningless. 

Fifthly. The terms finite and infinite are correla- 
tives. The apprehensions symbolized by them are, there- 
fore, correlatives. In his celebrated Critique on Cousin, 
Hamilton denies this. As one of these terms is, in 
thought, the negation of the other, instead of the reality 
of the infinite being suggested, it may be denied. The 
correlation does not necessitate "correality" ; but — 

In the first place, to say of something that it is not 
finite is to admit the thing of which the predication is 
made. Otherwise the predication is made of zero ; and 
to deny the finiteness of that thing, so far from denying 
its existence, is to affirm both its existence and its 
infinity. 

In the second place, even in the sphere of mere 
thought, correlatives involving a negation of one of the 



326 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

members do not always suppose the non-existence of 
the member which is the subject of the negation. Socra- 
tes as husband and Xanthippe as wife are correlatives ; 
but to affirm that Socrates was not Xanthippe would 
not be to deny the existence of the latter, nor her exist- 
ence as the wife of the philosopher. On the contrary, 
the negation supposes her existence. 

In the third place, Hamilton's criticism only holds 
good when the same thing is the subject of affirmation 
and negation. To affirm that a thing is finite is to deny 
that the same thing is infinite. The law of identity 
would be violated ; but to say that another thing is not 
finite, instead of denying that it exists, is to affirm its 
existence as infinite. 

In the fourth place, Hamilton unaccountably con- 
founds the spheres of thought and belief. If Cousin 
meant that, in thinking the finite, we also think the cor- 
relative infinite, he was wrong, and Hamilton, in that 
regard, was right in his criticism. If Hamilton meant 
that, in thinking the finite, we do not believe in the 
infinite, he was not only wrong, but inconsistent with 
his own doctrine, that we are under the necessity of be- 
lieving in the infinite, although we cannot think it. 

These considerations suffice to show that there is, 
imbedded in our mental constitution, a law adapting and 
constraining us to believe in the infinite. When, there- 
fore, in accordance with the other fundamental laws 
which have been indicated, we are led to believe in a 
personal being, who is the first substance and the first 
cause, we are incited by this law to affirm that he is 
infinite. In a word, we affirm the infinite God. 



Abgument foe the Being of God. 327 

Such is an outline of what is denominated the cosmo- 
logical argument for the divine existence. 

5. The next branch of the argument from our rational 
nature is what is called the teleological, or, after Kant, 
the physico-theological — the proof from final causes or 
from design. The argument here is from the funda- 
mental law of causation, combined with those of unity 
and sufficient reason, when developed upon the condi- 
tions of experience, to an intelligent designer of the 
universe. 

( 1.) Whether we look within us or without us, we are 
amazed at the multiformity of nature. We are con- 
founded by the almost limitless variety that confronts 
us on every hand, in the organic and inorganic realms, 
in the vegetable, the animal, and the intellectual do- 
mains. Phenomenal plurality and difference obtrude 
themselves on our observation in the worlds above us, 
the world around us, and the world within us. The 
insatiable demand for unity, ever crying out from the 
depths of our souls, forbids our being satisfied with this 
bewildering multifariousness. The principle of unity 
enforces the belief that the whole wondrously diversified 
scene can be reduced to harmony upon some all- 
comprehending plan; that the universe, complex and 
seemingly boundless as it is, is a cosmos, and not a vast, 
confused, howling wilderness. 

(2.) This demand, created by the fundamental prin- 
ciple of unity within us, is alike, in a measure, appeased 
and gratified by the appearance of order, which meets 
us on every side. That this result should be reached, it 
is not necessary that we should know the ends of this 



328 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

order. It utters a general lesson which is easily learned. 
Some final cause we are compelled to suppose as its 
explanation, or the analogy of our own experience is 
utterly deceptive. JSTor can we evade the conviction that 
it originates in an intelligent, organizing mind, as its 
efficient cause. Such is the majestic sweep of this all- 
prevailing orderliness that it would be preposterous to 
assign it to more than one cause. A pervading law, in 
accordance with which all specific laws operate — a law 
of laws — it bespeaks one source alone from which it 
emanates, one sovereign authority which it expresses. 

(3.) The argument to a supreme intelligence is im- 
mensely enhanced by special adaptations, too numerous 
to be counted, too exquisite to be sufficiently admired. 
"Not only is science at every stride in its magical progress 
widening our apprehensions of general order springing 
from the reign of law, but multiplying the instances of 
particular adjustments of the most surprising and mar- 
vellous character. It were difficult to say whether the 
revelations of the telescope or those of the microscope 
impress us with the greater astonishment; whether the 
grand march of astronomy or the minute analysis of 
entomology thrills us with the profounder feeling. We 
stand between two oceans, the great and the small, and 
listening in wondering awe to the mysterious sounds of 
both, we gather them up into a hymn of rapturous ado- 
ration to a supreme intelligence. To deny intelligence 
as the cause of this general order, and these special 
adaptations, and as the bond of unity to all, is to stifle 
the voice of reason herself. Of such frenzy no other 
account can be furnished than the hope that, in sinking 



Argument foe the Being of God. 329 

out of view a God of intelligence, men may get rid of a 
God of retributive justice. 

Add to these considerations the inferences necessarily 
springing from the law of the sufficient reason, it matters 
little whether, regarded as a law of thought or of real 
being, and the proof is completed that there is a being of 
power, intelligence and wisdom adequate to the produc- 
tion of the wondrous order, and the admirable adjust- 
ments which pervade the universe. Then, finally, we 
supplement this separate teleological proof by the cosmo- 
logical, especially as it involves the necessary faith- 
judgment enforced by the fundamental law of belief in 
the infinite, and we are thus irresistibly impelled to 
affirm the infinite God, who is as well the organizer as 
the creator of the universe. We are compelled to con- 
solidate the two arguments by the unity which reigns in 
our faculties. 

To this argument from design sundry objections have 
been urged, which will be briefly noticed. 

First. It is objected that this argument only proves 
vast intelligence in arranging the universe, not power in 
producing it — an Architect, not a Creator. Kant, who 
uses this objection, has himself gone far to neutralize it 
by the following admissions: 

" This proof will always deserve to be treated with 
respect. It is the oldest, the clearest, and most in con- 
formity with human reason. It gives life to the study 
of nature, deriving its own existence from it, and thus 
constantly acquiring new vigor. It reveals aims and 
intention where our own observation would not by itself 
have discovered them, and enlarges our knowledge of 



330 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

nature by leading us towards that peculiar unity the 
principle of which exists outside nature. This know- 
ledge reacts again on its causey-namely, the transcen- 
dental idea — and thus increases the belief in a supreme 
author to an irresistible conviction. It would, there- 
fore, be not only extremely sad, but utterly vain to 
attempt to diminish the authority of that proof. " 1 

Without considering the question, whether Kant can 
be harmonized with himself, let us note the answers 
which may be furnished to the objection in hand. 

In the first place, even if it were granted that this 
teleological argument, separately considered, would not 
avail to prove the infinity of God, or his creative relation 
to the universe, it need not on that account be pro- 
nounced worthless. It would still serve the purpose of 
proving vast power, vast intelligence, vast wisdom, in- 
conceivably vast, in the architect and organizer of the 
cosmical universe; and it might be contended that, as 
it is intended to accomplish only that result, it has not 
failed as an argument. The admission made by the 
objection shows its success in this regard; and as it 
achieves this great end, it may be urged that it is to be 
interwoven with the general argument in order to 
enhance and round it as a complex whole; that it dis- 
charges the office of a separate strand in strengthening a 
cable. It is not the cable, but is invaluable in its compo- 
sition. In a word, it may be fairly said that even though 
it were incomplete in itself, it is indispensable to the 
completeness of the argument as a whole. Upon the 

1 Transcend. Dialectic : Max Miiller's Trans, of Crit. Pure 
Reason, Vol. II., p. 534. 



Argument foe the Being of God. 331 

supposition that a first cause of the universe has been 
otherwise proved, it certainly negatives the position that 
that cause is a blind force operating by necessity — 
merely a an infinite and eternal energy." But — 

In the second place, it is not as clear as the objectors 
suppose it to be, that the teleological argument does not 
of itself avail to prove a first cause, who is the creator 
of the universe. Upon this point the Bev. Professor 
Bobert Flint, of Edinburgh, has the following acute and 
striking observations : 

" It is remarkable, too, that those who have urged this objection 
have never felt that before employing it they were bound to satisfy 
themselves and to prove to others that order is a mere surface or 
superficial thing — outside of matter, superimposed on it. If order 
be something inherently and intrinsically in matter — be of its very 
essence — belong to what is ultimate in it; if matter and its form 
be inseparable — then the author of its order must have been also 
the author of itself; and all that this objection shows us is, that 
those who have employed it have had mistaken notions about the 
nature of matter. Now, as I have already had to indicate, modern 
science seems rapidly perfecting the proof of this. The order in 
the heavens, and in the most complicated animal organisms, 
appears to be not more wonderful than the order in the ultimate 
atoms of which they are composed. The balance of evidence is 
in favor of the view that order extends as far and penetrates as 
deep as matter itself does. The human intellect is daily learning 
that it is foolish to fancy that there is anywhere in matter a 
sphere in which the Divine Wisdom does not manifest itself in and 
through order. 

" There is still another remark to be made on the objection 
under consideration. The immediate inference from the order of 
the universe is to an intelligent former of the universe, not to a 
creator. But this does not preclude the raising of the question, 
Is it reasonable to believe the former of the world merely its 
former? Must not its former be also its creator? On the con- 
trary, the inference that the order of the world must be the result 
of intelligent agency ought to suggest this question to every seri- 



332 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ous and reflective mind, and it should even contribute something to 
its answer. The order of the universe must have originated with 
intelligence. What is implied in this admission? Clearly that 
the order of the universe cannot have originated with matter — 
that matter is unintelligent, and cannot account either for intelli- 
gence or the effects of intelligence. The supposition that matter 
is eternal must in this case be supplemented by the admission that 
mind is eternal. In other words, the affirmation that the former 
of the world is merely its former — the denial that its former is 
also its creator — means dualism, the belief in two distinct eternal 
existences — an eternal mind and eternal matter. Whoever is not 
prepared to accept this hypothesis must abandon the affirmation 
and the denial from which it necessarily follows. And who can, 
after due deliberation, accept it? The law of parsimony of causes 
absolutely forbids our assuming, for the explanation of anything, 
more causes than are necessary to account for it. It forbids, 
therefore, our belief in an eternal matter and an eternal mind, 
unless we can show reason for holding that one of them alone is 
not a sufficient cause of the universe. Now those who grant the 
inference from order to intelligence, themselves admit that mat- 
ter is not a sufficient First Cause of the universe as it actually 
exists. Do they find any person admitting that mind would be an 
insufficient First Cause? Do they themselves see any way of 
showing its insufficiency? Do they not even perceive that it would 
be foolish and hopeless to try to show that an eternal mind could 
not create a material universe, and that all they could show would 
be, the here quite irrelevant truth, that the human mind is igno- 
rant of the manner in which this could be done? If the answers 
to these questions are what I believe they must be, it must also 
be acknowledged that the former of the universe can only be 
rationally thought of as also its creator." x 

To these considerations it may be added, in the third 
place, that if the thinking faculty cannot, in consequence 
of the evidences of design in the universe, affirm the 
existence of an infinite God, neither can it deny that 
existence. In fact, it cannot deny a vast finite intelli- 

1 Theism, pp. 171-174. 



Argument foe the Being of God. 333 

gence and power lying beyond all possible bounds of 
conception. The telescope, for example, has revealed 
stretches of the universe which were never dreamed of in 
thought. Beyond these expanded ranges of being the 
imagination is able to pursue her flight. She may 
imagine systems now unperceived, even by the tele- 
scope, analogous to those which come under observation ; 
but were one to go on for a life-time, day by day and 
night by night, in his imagination to add systems to 
systems, he would in age be perfectly convinced that 
there yet lie measureless systems beyond, and that no 
sensible approximation had been made to a grasp even 
of finite being. What is here intimated is that, at the 
outmost verge of the imagination's possibilities, there 
cannot be a denial of a still greater scope of finite exist- 
ence than has been actually compassed; that, on the 
contrary, the presumption is that fathomless depths of 
being lie beyond the line of the imagination ; and that, 
so far from a denial of the infinite being possible, a 
positive presumption is created in its favor by the in- 
ability of thought or imagination to limit the finite. 
Were it possible for the conceiving faculty to measure 
the vast finite and affix its boundaries, the case would be 
different ; but this it cannot possibly do ; and as, there- 
fore, it cannot deny the unlimited, no more is it com- 
petent to deny the illimitable. As it cannot deny the 
indefinite, it cannot the infinite. A vast intelligence 
suggested by the teleological argument certainly is be- 
yond the comprehension of thought ; and it may be an 
infinite intelligence. This possibility is at least hinted 
by that argument. Now the mind of man is one ; and 



334 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

the fundamental law of belief in the infinite, which 
accompanies the cosmological argument and projects it 
to the positive affirmation of an infinite first cause and 
first substance, also attends the teleological and exalts it 
to the positive affirmation of an infinite intelligence. 
This is a well-nigh universal fact, and no exceptional 
speculation or perverse skepticism can successfully gain- 
say it. Men, in general, refuse to concede that the 
intelligence displayed in this wondrous universe is finite. 

Secondly. It is objected that the argument from 
design, instead of inferring an infinite and perfect, con- 
ducts us to a finite and imperfect intelligence. The 
remarkable proof of this position is that design implies 
contrivance, and contrivance supposes choice, and there- 
fore limitation. The designer depends on means, 
instead of immediately producing results by his fiat; 
but one answer will here be given. 

Intelligence without wisdom is defective. The high- 
est intelligence embraces the greatest wisdom. Wisdom 
is exercised in the selection of the means fitted to secure 
contemplated ends. The highest wisdom displays itself 
in the choice of the best means to produce the noblest 
ends. Were the intelligence exhibited in the arrange- 
ment of the universe destitute of wisdom, it would be 
defective ; but the order and adjustments of the universe 
evince, in the selection of the most fitting means to 
secure transcendently noble ends, the most consummate 
wisdom. This consideration is sufficient to refute the 
objection before us, and to prove the intelligence con- 
cerned about the fashioning of the universe to have been 
perfect. What a strange objection is this, proceeding 



Argument for the Being of God. 335 

as it does upon the supposition that the possession of 
perfect wisdom infers an imperfect intelligence ! One 
would imagine that John Stuart Mill was sorely pressed 
for arguments against God when he excogitated this. 

Thirdly. The teleological argument has been flip- 
pantly dubbed as "the carpenter theory." It is objected 
that the theist represents God as a mere mechanic or 
artificer. It is hard to see either the relevancy or the 
consistency of this objection. How is it relevant? No 
theist holds that the divine being is simply a constructor 
of mechanisms. Even if, with Lotze, the extreme 
ground were taken that the universe is a mechanism, it 
certainly would not be denied that it involves organisms. 
The theist contends that God is the author of organized 
beings containing a principle of reproduction, and de- 
velopment according to the laws of life. How, then, 
does he represent God as a mere carpenter? It is 
enough to say that Mr. Spencer and others in urging 
this objection against the teleology of the theist mis- 
represent it. 

Further, how is the objection consistent ? Mr. 
Spencer maintains that there is "an infinite and eternal 
energy," which furnishes the ground and explanation 
of the universe — an unknown, but fundamental, reality. 
He also holds that this force proceeds by the inflexible 
law of evolution in the development of all things. Now, 
either this infinite and eternal energy is itself the prin- 
ciple of evolution, that out of which the universe is 
developed, or not. If the former, how can he account 
for the element of design in the intelligence of a Newton, 
for example, or a Napoleon ? It will not be contended 



336 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

that the Principia of Newton, or the campaigns of Na- 
poleon were the results of mere fortuity, that they hap- 
pened by chance. It will not be denied that the Prin- 
cipia and the campaigns were planned to secure ends, 
that they had designs in view. How, then, did these 
intelligences, containing the element of design, come to 
be evolved out of an ultimate energy entirely destitute 
of such an element ? If it be replied that it was possible 
for intelligence, characterized by the element of design, 
to have been developed from an "energy" devoid of it, 
absurdity results. If, that the primordial "energy" 
contained potentially the element of design, then it may 
have designed the mind of a Newton or a Napoleon; 
and, further, it must itself have formed the designs of 
those great men, since, ex hypothesi, they were evolved 
out of it, and could not, therefore, have been substan- 
tially different from it. 

If the "infinite and eternal energy" is not itself the 
principle of evolution, it follows that it caused the 
primal element or elements which constituted the evolv- 
ing source. Now, either those elements contained in 
them potentially the feature of design, or not. If they 
did, how could they have originated from a causal energy 
destitute of design, devoid of personality, and operating 
by a blind, unintelligent law of necessity ? If they did 
not, how came intelligent, designing minds to be evolved 
out of them? If Mr. Spencer's "infinite and eternal 
energy" was not characterized by purpose, it had not the 
sense of a carpenter. If it was, it had not the dignity 
of a carpenter, for he is independent of that which he 
constructs and superior to it. Evolution makes the 



Abgument foe the Being of God. 337 

builder and the house one and the same, the organizer 
and the organism identical. To my mind, the so-called 
"carpenter theory" has the advantage; but invest, as 
the theist does, the carpenter with the power to create 
life, and to regulate its development, and the theory 
rises to immeasurable superiority. In fine, if Mr. 
Spencer's theory of evolution admits design, his objec- 
tion to the teleological argument is inconsistent with his 
theory; and if it does not, his theory is self -contradic- 
tory. 

Kant characterizes the argument from the speculative 
reason for the existence of God as sophistical. He 
maintains that the physico-theological (teleological) and 
the cosmological proofs depend upon the ontological, and 
as he holds that to be invalid, he pronounces the whole 
argument inconclusive. Now it is true, as has already 
been conceded, that the cosmological and the teleological 
arguments are necessitated and enforced by a 'priori 
elements in the form of fundamental laws of belief in 
our mental constitution. They are partly ontological; 
but it is not true that they are founded upon the so-called 
ontological argument, contemplated as a separate and 
finished whole, possessed of self-sufficient validity. 

In its original and, as is claimed by its friends, its 
purest form as presented by Anselm, the ontological 
argument concludes from the "idea" or "concept" of 
absolutely perfect being to its necessary existence, and 
from its necessary existence to its actual existence. The 
form in which it was put by Leibnitz, and in which it 
was criticised by Kant is briefly : A being whose essence 
infers his existence, if it is possible, is; but God is a 



338 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

being whose essence infers his existence ; therefore, God 
if he is possible, is. 

Kant's refutation, succinctly stated, is in the general : 
From the concept of an ideal being, it is illegitimate to 
conclude to a real, objectively existent, being. This po- 
sition he presses in a specific form by appealing to his 
distinction between an analytical and a synthetical prop- 
osition. An analytical proposition is one in which the 
predicate adds nothing to the subject, but simply evolves 
its contents. It is merely explicative. A synthetical 
proposition is one in which the predicate adds something 
substantively to the subject. It is amplincative. In the 
analytical proposition you would be guilty of a contra- 
diction should you deny the predicate of the subject, 
but there would be no contradiction were you to deny 
both the predicate and the subject. In the synthetical 
proposition there would be no contradiction in denying 
the predicate of the subject, since that holds good only 
of identical judgments involved in analytical proposi- 
tions. 

Now here the proposition is either analytical or syn- 
thetical. If analytical, the predicate, existence, is 
affirmed of being, the subject, which already contains 
existence, and naught but tautology results ; and, while 
it would be contradictory to deny existence of the subject 
being, if the being were not merely assumed, but pre- 
viously proved, there is no contradiction in this instance, 
for the being is merely assumed, as it is the very design 
of the argument to prove it. Both predicate and subject 
may, without contradiction, be denied. If the proposi- 
tion is synthetical, it is admitted that the predicate 



Argument foe the Being of God. 339 

existence (real, objective existence) adds something to 
the subject not already contained in it; but there would 
be no contradiction in denying the predicate of the sub- 
ject, inasmuch as such a contradiction is possible only 
where identical judgments are involved, and this propo- 
sition, as confessedly synthetical, does not involve an 
identical judgment. Real existence, then, may, without 
a contradiction, be denied of the being conceived. The 
peculiar force of this member of the dilemma depends 
on Kant's doctrine, that real existence is derived from 
the sphere of phenomena alone. Therefore, this propo- 
sition, considered as synthetical, employs an empirical 
predicate of a purely ontological subject. In short, if 
the proposition be analytical, it is worthless ; if syntheti- 
cal, it is impossible. 

The answer to all this is that both the refutation, and 
the argument against which the refutation is directed, 
are founded upon the fallacious assumption that it is 
possible to form a concept of an absolutely perfect or 
infinite being. Kant's ideas of the pure reason are, as 
he himself terms them, concepts. His concepts of the 
understanding are but groupings into unity of the repre- 
sentations of sense-intuitions ; and his ideas of the pure 
reason are but higher conceptual groupings into unity 
of the concepts of the understanding. Now, as, at the 
bottom, concepts depend upon perception for the mate- 
rials which they elaborate in thought-relations, it is 
certain that no percept can furnish the materials for a 
concept of a perfect or infinite being. There can be, 
therefore, no concept, strictly speaking, of such a being. 
Consequently, no valid argument, in the form of a regu- 



340 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

lar syllogism constructed of concepts, can be legitimately 

framed for the existence of an infinite being. Neither 

can there be a valid argument to the contrary, which 

admits the possibility of a concept of an infinite being. 

Both kinds of argument are baseless. 

Cousin, who allows the force of Kant's criticism of 

the Leibnitzian syllogism, adds one of his own : 

"This syllogism," he says, "is perfectly regular, and there is 
either no such thing as logic in the world, or the conclusion is 
demonstrated. But what is the nature of this conclusion? Ac- 
cording to the laws of logic itself, it should be conformable to the 
nature of the major and minor premises united. Let us examine 
these premises. The major, as Leibnitz says, is an identical axiom 
(axioma identicum) . It is a general and abstract proposition. 
The existence and the essence spoken of are taken in a purely 
abstract point of view. As to the minor, it contains a general 
definition of God, in which the existence of this being is also con- 
sidered in an abstract point of view, and not as a real being, since 
it is this reality itself which is required in the conclusion, and to 
suppose it in the minor would be to make a petitio principii, to 
beg the question. If, then, the major is abstract, and the minor 
partakes of the same character, I ask again, What should be the 
nature of the conclusion? Necessarily an abstract conclusion, in 
which existence is taken abstractly, as in the premises. From the 
combination of the two abstract premises, nothing but an abstrac- 
tion can follow. The syllogism, therefore, though good in itself, 
has, and can have, no other than a syllogistic value. The exist- 
ence which it involves can be only existence in general, an abstract 
state, destitute of any true reality." 1 

While, however, he admits the unwarrantableness of 
a regular syllogism starting with a major premise con- 
taining the concept of a perfect being, Cousin contends 
that the Cartesian argument is to be vindicated when 
stated in a certain form. What is that form ? That in 

1 The Phil, of Kant, Lect. VI. 



Argument for the Being of God. 341 

which Descartes presents the argument for one's own 
existence : "Cogito, ergo Sum/' He holds that this is 
not a syllogism, but an enthymeme. If, however, Sir 
William Hamilton is right, the enthymeme is but a 
syllogism, imperfectly expressed, in which either the 
major premise, or the minor, or the conclusion may be 
wanting ; it is not a peculiar species of reasoning. 1 But 
that question aside, Cousin's meaning evidently is that 
from the affirmation, / think, we pass immediately to 
the affirmation, / exist. So, from the affirmation, I am 
imperfect or finite, we pass immediately to the affirma- 
tion, a perfect or infinite being exists. 

!N~ow, what is the nature of that passage ? What sort 
of act is it ? Here this usually perspicuous writer uses 
terms so various and apparently incongruous with each 
other to express one and the same act that it is difficult 
to grasp his meaning perfectly. Extracts from himself 
will illustrate this. Sometimes he uses perception to 
designate the act. "The indirect, it may be, but real 
perception of the me." "It is the living perception of a 
living thought in a living personal self." "The syllo- 
gism of Leibnitz, as it stands, justifies the objections of 
Kant ; but they vanish when it is traced to its source, to 
the true Cartesian proof, just as the objections of Kant 
against the substantial reality of the me vanish in restor- 
ing to the cogito, ergo sum its true meaning, and when 
instead of attempting to construct a syllogism, we invest 
it with the unquestionable authority of an immediate 
and spontaneous perception." Frequently he employs 
the terms conception, conceive. "The primitive concep- 

1 Logic, pp. 276 ff. Boston Ed. 



342 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

tion of the reason." "It is an immediate conception, 
resting upon no principle, on nothing intermediate." 
"At the same time that I recognize the imperfection of 
my own being, I conceive a perfect being." "The truth 
is that primitively the reason, as soon as it conceives the 
imperfection of my being, conceives a perfect being." 
"You can imagine a gorgon, a centaur, to exist, and you 
can imagine them not to exist ; but is it in your power, 
the finite and the imperfect being given, to conceive or 
not to conceive the infinite and the perfect ?" etc. Very 
often he adopts the term idea, so often as to make it 
needless to quote. 

He also uses the word reveals. "No major premise 
can fill up the gap which separates being from thought, 
phenomena from substance, attribute from subject. It 
is reason itself which, by its own inherent power, over- 
leaps this abyss, which reveals (the word is here per- 
fectly legitimate) the hidden, but real subject of every 
phenomenon, of every thought." Sometimes he even 
resorts to the term consciousness. "I am, therefore, a 
substance which knows itself by a science the most cer- 
tain of all, since it is the most immediate, conscious- 
ness." "A primitive and permanent fact of conscious- 
ness." [This in regard to the Cartesian proof of God's 
existence.] The term judgment also occurs. "Now, 
this character of finite cannot be given to us, as we have 
seen, without the reason instantly entering into exercise, 
and passing this judgment, that there is something in- 
finite, if there is something finite." This judgment is 
elsewhere spoken of as a "spontaneous conviction." 
Finally, Cousin uses the term faith. Speaking of sav- 



Abgument eoe the Beijstg of God. 343 

ages lie says : "You rna y be sure that what they see of 
themselves and of the world does not suffice them, and 
that they are humbled and exalted in the intimate faith 
in the existence of something infinite, perfect, that is, 
of God." x 

Of these terms, designating the act by which we pass 
from imperfect or finite to the perfect or infinite, some 
must, if rigorously construed, be rejected as inappli- 
cable. That we perceive, are conscious of, that we may 
conceive, ourselves as imperfect, as finite — this is evi- 
dent ; but it is equally manifest that, strictly speaking, 
we cannot perceive or be conscious of, and that we can- 
not conceive, a perfect or infinite being. The terms 
reveals, revelation, are, in a certain sense, proper, but 
they are vague and indefinite ; they do not describe the 
nature of the act by which the alleged revelation is 
made; and they are also liable to the interpretation 
that by them is meant an act by which we are conscious 
of, have an immediate intuition of, the perfect and 
infinite, a sense in which Jacobi employed them ; in- 
correctly, in this relation. In the sense in which Sir 
W. Hamilton used them, they are, to my mind, admis- 
sible and correct. The term judgment is that which 
expresses the true nature of the mental act by which we 
pass from the imperfect to the perfect, from the finite 
to the infinite. Conscious that we are imperfect, that 
we are finite we judge that there is a perfect, an infinite, 
being. This judgment is an inference, a necessary and 
immediate inference, so swiftly, so instantaneously de- 

1 These citations are made from his Lectures on Phil, of Kant, 
and his Course of Hist. Mod. Philosophy. 



344 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

rived from the consciousness of our imperfection, our 
finiteness, that the difference between the datum of 
consciousness and the inference from it is appreciable 
only to reflection. Contemporaneous they may be, but 
in the order of thought or nature they differ and may be, 
therefore, reflectively disjoined. The imperfect, the 
finite, being given, there must be the perfect, the in- 
finite; and this necessary judgment is immediately 
passed — immediately, both in the sense that there is no 
intervening medium, no middle, and in the sense that 
there is no perceptible interval of time, between the 
conscious experience and the inferential judgment. 

But were there any reasonable objection to this mode 
of stating the matter, this form of statement may be 
adopted: The conscious experience of imperfection, of 
finiteness constitutes the condition upon which the judg- 
ment affirming a perfect, an infinite, being, is necessa- 
rily and immediately passed. The practical result is 
the same ; but the former mode of statement is to be pre- 
ferred, for this reason: a necessary and immediate 
inference from a datum is confessedly of equal validity 
and authority with the datum itself. Now we need the 
assurance of the incontestable authority of the judgment 
affirming a perfect, an infinite being; and as a datum 
of consciousness is possessed of such authority, a neces- 
sary and immediate inference from it is equally authori- 
tative. The inference would appear to be necessitated 
by the correlation between the two apprehensions, im- 
perfect or finite and perfect or infinite. It is as 
necessary as the inference from husband to wife. 

What, however, is here contended for is that, given 



Aegument foe the Being of God. 345 

the conscious experience of imperfection and finiteness, 
the judgment affirming a perfect, or, what is the same, 
an infinite, being, is necessary and immediate. It is a 
"spontaneous conviction" of our souls enforced by the 
operation of a fundamental law of our constitution. 
The necessity and immediateness of the judgment ren- 
ders the proposition, There is a perfect or infinite being, 
self-evident. 

This, however, is not all that is required for an eluci- 
dation of the subject. The important question arises, 
By what faculty or power is this judgment passed ? 
Negatively, the answer is that it is not thought, for 
thought cannot transcend consciousness, and conscious- 
ness cannot supply the materials for this judgment. It 
is not a thought- judgment. It was in proceeding upon 
that supposition that the transcendental or absolutist 
philosophy took its fundamental departure from the 
truth. 1 Affirmatively, the answer is that the judgment 
by which the mind passes necessarily and immediately 
from the imperfect to the perfect, from the finite to the 
infinite, is formed by faith. It is a faith- judgment. 
Conscious of the phenomenal imperfect or finite, we 
strive by imagination and conception to think the per- 
fect, the infinite. We expand the concept of the former 
to the highest possible degree. But, of necessity, we 
reach only the relatively perfect, the vast finite. Awak- 
ened from latency by this condition furnished in expe- 
rience, the innate capacity of faith, and, in this par- 
ticular relation, the fundamental law of belief in the 
infinite, necessitate and enforce the judgment which 

1 See Discussion of Pantheism. 



346 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

affirms the perfect, the infinite. 1 As faith is, so far 
forth as it is intellectual, a specific function of the 
reason, this is the highest affirmation of intelligence. It 
is not a mere negative protest of thought, denying all 
limitation upon its most exalted concept ; it is a positive 
judgment. 

Is, then, the argument from a faith- judgment, affirm- 
ing a perfect, an infinite, being, a pure a 'priori argument 
for the existence of God ? It certainly contains an 
a priori element, but the question, whether it is, as 
a priori, complete and self-sufficient, independently of 
a posteriori elements, must be answered in the negative. 
Let it be borne in mind that an a posteriori argument is 
one in which we "set out from experience," and in the 
a priori, we "throw aside all experience," and conclude 
from the mental apprehension of a perfect, an infinite, 
being to his existence. 

1. We must set out with the conviction of our own 
existence ; for were we non-existent, any argument for 
the existence of another being, grounded upon the 
mental processes of one non-existent would be, of course, 
itself non-existent. This conviction of our existence is 
founded, in the last analysis, upon consciousness. It 
matters not, so far as this argument is concerned, 
whether it is held that we are directly conscious of 
existence, or that we necessarily and immediately infer, 
or, at least, judge, that we exist in consequence of the 
consciousness of mental phenomena. In either case con- 

1 The question whether there be a Faculty of Faith is con- 
sidered in the Discussion of Herbert Spencer's Relativity of 
Knowledge. 



Argument for the Being of God. 347 

sciousness is supposed, and that implies experience. We 
start, then, in the a priori argument for God's existence 
with the conscious experience which leads to the convic- 
tion of our own. It is conditioned upon that experience 
as an a posteriori element. 

2. In the a priori argument there is also supposed the 
conscious experience of our imperfection, our finiteness. 
It is impossible to doubt this datum of consciousness. 
This conscious experience conditions our judgment that 
there is a perfect, an infinite, being. Here again we 
have an empirical, an a posteriori, element entering into 
the argument as a whole. 

In regard to both of these empirical elements, it may 
be contended that while their existence is not denied, 
they do not enter as integers into the a priori argument 
itself; that that proof exists concurrently and coordi- 
nately with them, but is as native to the mind as they ; 
that we are as directly conscious of God, as the 
all-perfect being, as we are of our existence and of 
our imperfections — in short, that we have a " God- 
consciousness.'' But, in the first place, this, as an 
alleged fact, is denied. Consciousness is limited to the 
phenomenal, internal or external, and to say that God 
is, in himself, phenomenal is to gainsay common sense, 
as well as the best philosophy and the catholic theology 
of the ages. In the second place, if we are conscious of 
God, it would not only follow that, as the proof of his 
existence furnished by the direct testimony of conscious- 
ness would be, in itself, complete and irrefragable, no 
a priori argument, in syllogistic form, would be needed ; 
but, also, that the so-called a priori proof would become 



348 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

purely empirical and a posteriori, since the proof fur- 
nished by consciousness is confessedly of that character. 
Here the argumentum ad hominem is as irresistible as it 
is necessary. 

It may be replied that, in being conscious of a con- 
cept, a belief — whatever the mental act may be called — 
of a perfect or infinite being, we have a conscious know- 
ledge of him as conceived, as believed. The rejoinder is 
that while this might, in a sense, be true, were it only a 
concept which was the subject of the affirmation, the 
fact is, as has already been shown, that no concept, 
strictly speaking, of God is possible. It may, however, 
be contended that, in having a belief in God of which 
we are conscious, we are also conscious of him as be- 
lieved in. This is a profound mistake. There are 
many things of which we have a conscious belief, while 
of the things themselves we have no consciousness. We 
have, for example, a conscious belief in the essence of 
our souls. Would it not be sheer folly to say that we 
are conscious of that essence itself ? But, as that ques- 
tion was considered in another discussion, 1 no more will 
be now said in relation to it. 

3. A judgment — however denominated — afiirming 
the existence of a perfect or infinite being, would not, 
by itself, affirm the existence of attributes qualifying 
that being. It would be simply apprehended as the 
primordial substance of the Spinozan pantheist. It 
certainly would not be God, a personal spirit, a freely 
acting cause, possessed of wisdom, power, holiness, jus- 
tice, goodness and truth. Now, how do we get the 

1 Discussion on the Nature of Consciousness. 



Argument for the Being of God. 349 

apprehension of attributes ? The answer must be, From 
experience. We observe certain effects which we neces- 
sarily ascribe to attributes as their causes. Certain 
phenomenal changes which we observe, for instance, we 
assign to the attribute of power as their cause. So with 
other attributes. It may be said that this is a begging 
of the question ; that we are obliged to do no more than 
to recognize these effects as related to forces inherent in 
nature, and these forces we are not compelled to appre- 
hend as attributes ; but this is not to beg the question, 
for we proceed in accordance with the analogies of our 
own being. Certain effects produced by ourselves we 
inevitably assign to power, to intelligence, to justice, 
to mercy, and these proximate causes we know to be 
attributes of our souls. They are not mere indepen- 
dently operating forces. In like manner, perceiving 
effects which could not be produced by ourselves or any 
other human beings, we irresistibly assign them to proxi- 
mate causes, which again, by a necessary law, we refer 
as attributes to substance; and as we are not satisfied 
short of unity, we ascribe them to one supreme sub- 
stance. Thus we apprehend, not a substance naked and 
unqualified, but one so and so characterized : we appre- 
hend God. 

Should it be urged that while this may hold in regard 
to a belief in an infinite being, it would not hold con- 
cerning a concept of an all-perfect being, that such a 
concept, from the nature of the case, embraces attributes 
in its contents, it would be sufficient to repeat what has 
already been said, that we can have no concept of such 
a being. 



350 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

If, therefore, our belief in the attributes of God — 
and without attributes he would not be God — is condi- 
tioned upon our conscious observation of phenomena, 
another proof is added of the position that empirical, or 
a posteriori,, elements cannot be detached from the 
a priori constituent in the argument for the existence of 
God. 

4. To the foregoing reasoning the Anselmic argument, 
as stated and acutely defended by Dr. Shedd, and by him 
pronounced to be the purest form of the ontological 
argument for the being of God, 1 constitutes no exception. 

(1.) Anselm himself used the terms "idea" and "con- 
ception" interchangeably with reference to a perfect 
being, and Dr. Shedd expressly employs "idea" and 
"concept" convertibly in the same relation. In the case 
of the great Schoolman it might be pleaded, but in that 
of the learned and able author of the Dogmatic Theology 
it cannot, that the precise signification of conception 
and its product the concept was not definitely settled. 
That the latter regarded the concept in its strict and 
proper sense is evinced by the fact that he employs it 
as an element of the argument evolved in the form of a 
regular syllogism ; but, as it has been already contended, 
no concept of an all-perfect being is possible. It takes 
no elaborate argument to show that the apprehension of 
such a being transcends the scope of the logical under- 
standing, and it is clear that the concept is to be assigned 
to that faculty. This is not captious criticism, for if we 
can conceive God we can, at least in a measure, compre- 
hend him, and if anything is certain, it is that he is 

1 Dogmatic Theology, pp. 224 ff. 



Argument for the Being of God. 351 

utterly incomprehensible. This is the testimony alike 
of philosophy and of divine revelation. We firmly 
believe in the infinite God, but who, by searching with 
the organ of the thinking reason, can find him out ? 

A concept is a class-notion; but it is evident that 
such language cannot be applied to an infinite being. 
He constitutes no class. He is wholly unique and singu- 
lar. As he is infinite, there is nothing like him, nothing 
with which he can be compared, no quality common 
between him and anything else. He is not a species 
included under a genus, else he were not infinite. He is 
not himself a genus, including species under him, for on 
that supposition the species included under him would 
include his essence in them, since the essence of the 
genus descends into the species. He is not subject to 
the laws of logic, or, what is the same thing, he cannot, 
as infinite, be conceived. This it is true, is expressly 
admitted in Dr. Shedd's defence of Anselm's argument ; 
and yet it is held that Anselm constructed "the ontologi- 
cal argument in a syllogistical form." This makes it 
employ the concept of a perfect being as a class-notion, 
which will be evinced by a full development of the argu- 
ment, which really embraces two syllogisms. The first 
is : If we have the concept of a perfect being, we have 
that of its necessary existence; we have the concept of 
a perfect being; therefore, we have the concept of its 
necessary existence. The second is: If we have the 
concept of the necessary existence of a being, the being 
must actually exist ; we have such a concept ; therefore, 
the being must actually exist. 

On the supposition, therefore, that we have a concept 



352 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

of an all-perfect being, we are led to make it a sumption, 
implying a sub-sumption, in a syllogistic process. We 
get quit of this inconsistency, and of the whole difficulty, 
in adopting the view that we believe in an infinite being, 
when the fundamental laws of belief are elicited into 
formal expression upon the conditions of conscious ex- 
perience. 

(2.) Those who maintain that we have the conscious- 
ness of God's existence are involved in the inconsistency 
of trying to prove what is already certain, and neither 
needs further proof nor is capable of it. "Although the 
evidence," remarks Dr. Shedd, "for the divine existence 
which is most relied upon in scripture, and which is 
common to all men, is that of immediate consciousness, 
yet certain syllogistic arguments have been constructed 
which have the following uses," 1 etc. Again he says : 
"A proof of the divine existence is found in man's God- 
consciousness, considered as a universal and abiding 
form of human consciousness." 2 This language is too 
explicit to bear the construction that we are conscious 
of the "idea" or "concept" of God ; it expressly affirms 
the immediate consciousness of God. 

But the consciousness of an object is itself the most 
indubitable evidence of its existence. The conscious- 
ness of an object seen is "ocular demonstration" of its 
existence. This is the assumed standard of certainty. 
No other proof is demanded. The thing is autopistic. 
Were we, then, conscious of God, we would have unde- 
niable proof of his existence in that fact. Any other 
proof would be as superfluous as carrying coals to New- 
castle. Of each of the usual proofs it might with truth 

1 Dogmat. Theol., p. 221. ■ Ibid., p. 210. 



Argument eor the Being oe God. 353 

be said that its "occupation is gone." That we are not 
conscious of God is proved because, in the first place, if 
we were conscious of him, we could describe him. What- 
ever we are conscious of we can describe ; but it is 
evident that we cannot describe God. To describe some 
of his finite manifestations of himself is not to describe 
him, as the infinite God. In the second place, conscious- 
ness includes in its scope only the finite, and only so 
much of even the finite as is in relation to it. We may 
be conscious, for instance, of a section of a mountain 
range, or of the ocean, but only of that section of either 
which comes within the comprehension of vision. We 
may infer, or believe, upon testimony, that there is a 
vaster section which lies beyond the reach of the eye, but 
we are not conscious of it. So we may be conscious of a 
part of the finite, phenomenal manifestations of the 
infinite, while we cannot be conscious of even them as 
a whole; but of a part of the infinite we can have no 
consciousness whatever, for the simple reason that the 
infinite has no parts. We must either be conscious of it 
as a whole, or not conscious of it at all, and that a finite 
being can be conscious of the infinite as a whole is 
supremely absurd. God is not an object of presentative, 
intuitive, immediate knowledge. We immediately infer 
his existence, but cannot immediately know him. Im- 
mediate inference gives mediate knowledge. Conscious- 
ness never knows inf erentially and mediately ; nor does 
it know representatively ; it knows presentatively, intui- 
tively — in a word, immediately. Such knowledge of 
God no finite being can possibly have. To say that we 
may have a partial consciousness of him is the same as 



354 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

to say that we may have a consciousness of a part of 
him. To be partially conscious of a mountain range or 
of the ocean is to be conscious of a part of them ; but it 
has already been seen that we can have no consciousness 
of a part of the infinite, since it is a great whole indivis- 
ible into parts, either real or imaginary. To say that 
we may have an "indefinite consciousness' 7 of the infinite 
is to say nothing in regard to its extent or scope, but 
merely to point out that it is not clear, as to its nature, 
within the limits to which it is restricted ; and that is 
to affirm nothing as to its apprehension of the infinite, 
which infinitely transcends those limits. In the third 
place, consciousness is limited to phenomena, either 
within us or without us, and that God is a phenomenon, 
or an aggregate of phenomena, it were blasphemy to 
affirm. 

To all this it may be replied : That consciousness is 
treated with a technical narrowness which is unwar- 
rantable; that it has a wider scope than has been 
assigned to it ; that necessary and immediate inferences 
from consciousness are consciousness itself, upon the 
universally admitted principle that such inierences are 
of equal validity with that from which they are derived. 
The solution of this difficulty, which arises from some 
confusion of thought, is to be found in the consideration 
that consciousness itself, and necessary and immediate 
inferences from it, are of equal validity with each other, 
but they are not precisely the same. A representative 
image may be a good and necessary consequence from a 
percept of consciousness, but the representing image is 
no more that percept than imagination is consciousness, 



Argument for the Being of God. 355 

A concept may be logically inferable from percepts, but 
a concept is not a percept, any more than conception is 
consciousness. Beliefs may be necessarily and imme- 
diately inferred from the percepts of consciousness, but 
beliefs can no more be said to be percepts or acts of con- 
sciousness than belief to be consciousness. The distinc- 
tion admits of general application. A geometrical 
theorem consists of necessary inferences from axioms, 
but it were a solecism to call the inferences the axioms. 
A law necessarily infers certain obligations, but who 
would assert that the obligations are the law? While 
necessary inferences from geometrical axioms are of 
equal validity with the axioms, and while obligations 
which are necessarily inferred from a law are of equal 
validity with the law, theorems are not the same with 
axioms, nor obligations the same with law. So is it 
with consciousness. Immediate and necessary infer- 
ences from its data are of equal validity with itself, but 
they are not the same as consciousness itself. In fine, 
consciousness only perceives; it never infers. The 
inferences from its percepts must be derived by other 
faculties. 

This discussion of the proof furnished by our cogni- 
tive nature for the being of God will be closed with a 
passage from Cousin, which affords a striking testimony 
to the view which has been advocated : 

" These two proofs/' he observes, "are excellent, I repeat; and 
instead of choosing between them, it is necessary, like the human 
mind, to accept and employ them both. In fact, they so little 
exclude each other that each of them contains somewhat of the 
other. The argument a priori, for example, supposes an element 
a posteriori, a datum of observation and experience; for if the 



356 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

idea of the infinite and of the perfect leads directly to God, and if 
this idea is given by reason, and not by experience, it is not given 
to us independently of all exeperience, since reason would never 
give it to us without the simultaneous or anterior idea of the 
finite and of the imperfect, which is derived from experience ; only 
here the experimental datum is borrowed from consciousness, and 
not from the senses; and again we may say that every phenome- 
non of consciousness supposes a sensitive phenomenon, simultan- 
eous or anterior. An element a posteriori intervenes, then, as a 
condition of the demonstration a priori. So if we reflect upon it, 
the proof by experience or a posteriori implies an element purely 
rational or a priori. In fact, on what condition do you conclude 
from nature to God? On the condition that you admit or at least 
that you employ the principle of causality; for if you are deprived 
of this principle, you will contemplate, you will forever study the 
world, you will forever adore the order and the wisdom which 
reign in it, without ever elevating yourself to the supposition 
that all this is but an effect, that all this must have a cause. Take 
away the principle of causality, and there are no more causes for 
us, there is no longer either need or possibility of seeking or of 
finding any, and induction no longer goes from the world to God. 
Now, the principle of causality has clearly an experimental con- 
dition; but it is not itself borrowed from experience; it supposes 
it and is applied to it, but it governs and judges it; it belongs 
properly to the reason. Behold, then, in its turn, an element 
a priori in the proof a posteriori. . . . Finally, so many differ- 
ent effects, of which experience does not always show the connec- 
tion, might well conduct not to a single cause and to God, but to 
different causes and to a plurality of gods; and history justifies 
this belief. You then clearly see that the proof a posteriori, which 
at first needs the principle of causality, needs other principles still 
which direct the application of causality to experience, principles 
which in order to govern experience should not come from it, and 
should come from reason. The argument a posteriori therefore 
supposes more than one element a priori." 1 

1 Course of Hist. Mod. Phil., pp. 422, 423 ; Wright's Trans. 



MR. SPENCER'S AGNOSTIC PHIL- 
OSOPHY. 



IN" a preceding discussion, Mr. Herbert Spencer's 
theory of the relativity of knowledge was some- 
what carefully considered. It will, therefore, not now 
be subjected to particular examination. That theory 
may fairly be regarded as furnishing the fundamental 
element of agnosticism. It is the justification of a 
system professing to deal with the "unknowable." Ag- 
nosticism avowedly differs from positivism, so far at 
least as the former is maintained by Mr. Spencer and 
his school. The latter claims not to be a philosophy, but 
a scientific arrangement of phenomenal knowledge. All 
that is phenomenal may be known, and known with 
certainty. All that transcends phenomena is unknown, 
and therefore cannot be scientifically handled; but 
according to Mr. Spencer's statements, in his Recent 
Discussions, in which he repels the allegation that he is 
a positivist of the school of Compte, agnosticism, while 
it includes what is deemed true in positivism, goes be- 
yond it. It does not regard itself as restricted to the 
construction and classification of phenomenal facts, but 
as entitled to deduce inferences from them and to deal 
with those inferences philosophically. It is an ontology 
as well as a phenomenology. Admitting, with the posi- 
tivist, the unknowableness of what overpasses the limits 



358 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

of the phenomenal, it further claims to consider these 
unknowable elements as the object-matter of a legitimate 
philosophy. As, then, its specific difference contradis- 
tinguishing it to positivism is its philosophical treatment 
of the unknowable, it may justly be defined as the 
philosophy of the unknowable. Wonderful philosophy ! 
It " passeth knowledge. " Every intellectual effort 
exerted about any subject supposes knowledge — some 
knowledge at least. Philosophy, consequently, supposes 
knowledge; but knowledge necessarily implies things 
known. The differentiating property of this philosophy 
is the knowledge of things that are not, and cannot be, 
known. It is not only the knowledge, but the formally 
systematized knowledge, of the unknowable — the cogni- 
tion, the philosophical cognition of the incognoscible. 

Were this all, the egregious absurdity of its funda- 
mental position, of its very essence as a pretended phil- 
osophy, would put it beyond the pale of discussion ; but 
this formidable difficulty Mr. Spencer attempts to relieve 
by the statement that the fundamental reality, the ulti- 
mate force, the infinite and eternal energy, which is 
unknowable, .is apprehended by an indefinite conscious- 
ness. We are, although absolutely ignorant of it, 
"indefinitely conscious" of it ; but consciousness, to the 
extent to which it exists, whether great or small, is 
knowledge. Who ever heard of an unknowing conscious- 
ness? It would be equivalent to an unconscious con- 
sciousness, an unknowing knowledge. The proposition, 
therefore, that we are indefinitely conscious of anything 
is tantamount to the proposition that we indefinitely 
know it. Mr. Spencer, consequently, utters the contra- 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 359 

diction : We have no knowledge of the ultimate force ; 
we have some knowledge of it. That this is no peculiar 
construction of his position by an individual mind is 
apparent from the fact that it has been given by other 
minds. It is so patent that any one who stops to reflect 
upon his language must perceive it. Dr. McCosh, for 
instance, observes: "Though the discoverer of the un- 
known says it is unknowable, yet it turns out that he 
knows a great deal about it, and gives us information 
about it. He tells us that it exists and is a reality ; and 
surely this is some knowledge. He knows it to be with- 
out limit, and speaks of it as a force or power. . . . 
He knows that it is a cause producing an effect, and that 
it is the cause of all that is known. Surely the known 
cause of a known thing is so far known." x The agnostic 
philosophy, in short, is founded upon a contradiction in 
terms : We cannot know the infinite, but Ave do know it ; 
we are entirely ignorant of it, but we are partially 
acquainted with it; we indefinitely know the unknow- 
able. 

This is the first indictment which may be submitted 
against the agnostic philosophy. It is radically self- 
contradictory. Yet, paradoxical as it may seem, this 
self-contradictoriness gives it its polemic life, its fight- 
ing chance. It may be compared to the occupant of a 
castle with two apartments communicating with each 
other by a secret passage. Assail him in one, and he 
retreats to the other. Followed and forced to retire 
from the second, he flies back to the first. Prove that 
the agnostic is wrong when he asserts the unknowable- 

1 Realistic Philosophy, Vol. II., p. 269. 



360 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ness of the infinite, and he covers himself with the 
affirmation that it is partially knowable. Prove that his 
characterization of the infinite is inadequate, and he 
defends himself by affirming its unknowableness. First 
he does not know, then he knows in part, and finally 
vindicates his knowledge of a mutilated infinite by 
pleading that he does not know it. The theory is two- 
headed. Cut off one head, and while you address your- 
self to the excision of the other, the first grows again. 
Turn upon it, and the second resumes its place. The 
believer in a supernatural revelation would speedily end 
the contest by employing it to cauterize the wounds, as 
Iolaus was fabled to have seared with fire the bleeding 
necks of the Lerna3an Hydra, with which Hercules was 
contending. But as the argument is philosophical, an- 
other resort must be had, and there is really no need to 
invoke supernatural interposition. The knot does not 
require it. All that is necessary is to strike the two 
heads against each other until they are simultaneously 
destroyed by the battery. Demand of the agnostic if he 
asserts the unknowableness of the infinite. His answer 
is, Yes. Demand of him if he asserts the indefinite 
knowledge of the infinite. Again his reply is, Yes. 
Then, sir, one must retort : Your unknowableness can- 
cels your knowableness, and your knowableness your 
unknowableness. You commit philosophical suicide — 
you are felo-de-se. 

2. If this be so, it may be asked, Why not stop just 
here ? Why pursue the matter any further ? Why not 
leave the system to its fate, the inevitable fate of every 
system which is founded upon contradictory assump- 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 361 

tions, which contains in itself the elements of its own 
destruction ? It may, in the first place, be answered : 
While those who have submitted it to a careful exami- 
nation may perceive the fact that the edifice is based 
upon incongruous and explosive materials, it may be 
different with others, especially young and aspiring 
students. !N"ot having scrutinized its foundation, but 
allured by its fair and imposing appearance as a whole, 
or by the attractiveness of the several parts which con- 
stitute it, they enter it unconscious of the danger of ruin 
to which it and its occupants are exposed. If, by an 
examination which removes its external garniture and 
reveals the unsafe character of the superstructure itself, 
its insecure joints and the unsoundness of the materials 
which compose it, any ingenuous youth should be de- 
terred from accepting its dangerous shelter, the result 
would justify the task. Nor will this sort of labor be 
entirely worthless, if any who believe in God and rever- 
ence his name should by it be dissuaded from hanging 
about the porches of this doubtful structure, and tamper- 
ing with its peril, like the celebrated Eoman naturalist 
and pantheist who is said to have lost his life by ap- 
proaching, for scientific purposes, too near a discharging 
volcano. To speak without figure, it may be serviceable 
to call the attention of those who have not observed the 
self-contradiction lodged in the general principle of the 
theory as to knowledge to the untenableness of its par- 
ticular elements. 

In the second place, it may not be uninteresting or 
useless to show that its fundamental fallacy affects its 
special developments. Perhaps it will be found that the 



362 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

genius of self-contradiction which pervades its funda- 
mental assumptions infuses itself into all its particular 
features. Corrupt at the root, it is natural to expect that 
it will be corrupt throughout. To evince this would 
not be uninteresting, since another and a signal illustra- 
tion will be afforded of the law that false logical prin- 
ciples must conduct to false logical consequences; and 
it would not be useless, for this philosophical specula- 
tion tends to influence all the moral and religious 
interests of mankind, to exert a revolutionary effect 
upon the consentient faiths of the human race. It is 
not only the religionist, but the philanthropist, who is 
impelled to subject to a critical investigation all the 
prominent doctrines of a system so radical in its ten- 
dencies, so far-reaching in its results. 

In the third place, it is not necessary, nor, perhaps, 
sufficient to restrict the discussion to the proof of the 
self-contradiction inherent in the agnostic theory, but 
one is warranted in examining both of the contradictory 
parts of the theory, because each, separately from the 
other, is essentially atheistic. The self-contradiction 
invalidates the. theory as a whole, because it is convicted 
by it of a want of that coherence, which is vital to the 
integrity of the system ; but while this must be insisted 
upon as damaging to the system, as such, it is legitimate 
to take up each member of the pair of contradictories, 
and exhibit its falsity ; if for no other reason, for this : 
were these contradictories the only two which are pos- 
sible, we would, upon the principle of excluded middle, 
be compelled to accept one of them as true; but if a 
third supposition is possible, it might happen that it 



Spencek's Agnostic Philosophy. 363 

would prove to be the true alternative. The argument, 
in that case, would be obliged to show the untruth of 
both of the original pair of contradictories, before the 
truth of the third supposition could be established. 
ISTow, in the instance of this particular argument with 
the agnostic, both of the contradictories he asserts are 
atheistic; but the third supposition of theism exists. 
To establish this third alternative, both of the agnostic 
suppositions must be disproved — namely, the supposi- 
tion of the absolute unknowableness of the infinite, and 
that partial knowableness of the infinite, which he 
affirms ; for if either of them be true, atheism is estab- 
lished, and, consequently, theism overthrown. The fact 
that these contradictory affirmations are contained in 
Mr. Spencer's theory has already been evinced. 

The first of these inconsistent positions, to-wit, that 
the infinite is unknowable, is atheistic ; for if the infinite 
be unknowable, God is unknowable, since any other than 
an infinite God — that is, a finite God — is a contradic- 
tion in terms. A finite God would be no God at all; 
but if God be unknowable, he is, to us, non-existent. He 
would be out of all relation to our faculties. The agnos- 
tic may condescend ex gratia to say that he does not 
positively deny the possibility of a God ; he may exist, 
but he does not, and cannot, know the fact. As he does 
not mean, through excess of modesty, to confess excep- 
tional ignorance, he must be construed as affirming that 
God is unknowable by the whole race. Those who 
imagine that they know him are deluded fanatics. 
There is no such knowledge as they dream of possessing. 
If Mr. Spencer cannot know him, who else can? If, 



364 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

then, we cannot know that God exists, he is to us zero. 
This is atheism. To say, No knowledge of God, is to 
say, No God. It has been the purport of the foregoing 
discussions to disprove the hypothesis of the unknow- 
ableness of God. What follows will be mainly concerned 
with Mr. Spencer's knoivable unknowable. 

The second of the contradictory positions of the agnos- 
tic — namely, that the infinite is indefinitely known — is 
also atheistic. It is insisted upon, that this statement of 
the position is correct. An indefinite consciousness of 
the infinite is some knowledge of it, or it is nothing ; the 
terms have no meaning. Mr. Spencer affirms a trans- 
cendental reality. This, of course, is something. If it 
were not, if it were nothing, nothing could be predicated 
of it except that it is nothing. Here, then, we have an 
existing something. To this transcendental reality he 
proceeds to assign attributes which characterize it. He 
ascribes to it power ; for he denominates it a force, an 
energy; and until somewhat is written more clearly 
than has as yet been, concerning the difference between 
force and energy, one feels himself entitled to use these 
terms interchangeably. Force is power in energy. To 
talk of force abstractly from power which it expresses is 
to speak unintelligently. This reality is, therefore, 
powerful. He also attributes to it infinity. He ex- 
pressly designates it as an infinite energy. Here, then, 
is a characteristic attribute which differentiates this 
reality from all that is finite. He declares it to be 
eternal. He assigns to it the attribute of eternity ; that 
is, it never began, and will never end. Further, he 
admits its omnipresence. We have, then, an infinite, 



Spehceb's Agnostic Philosophy. 365 

eternal, omnipotent and omnipresent reality. Beyond 
this Mr. Spencer does not go. He knows enough about 
this transcendental, fundamental reality to ascribe to it 
these attributes, but he does not know enough about it to 
say that it is spiritual, or personal, or intelligent, or 
moral. The inquiry naturally springs up, Why did he 
stop where he did ? If certain phenomena justified the 
inferences to infinity, eternity, omnipotence and omni- 
presence, why should not others, equally obvious as data 
of consciousness, have legitimated the inferences to per- 
sonality, intelligence and morality ? 

It is difficult to perceive a valid reason for this arrest 
put upon the development of necessary inferences which 
Mr. Spencer, as far as he went, was right in making, 
unless it be that he full well knew that to develop the 
inferences deducible from all the phenomena would con- 
duct to God. It is fairly to be concluded that he meant 
to exclude the doctrine of God's existence ; but whatever 
may have been the reason of this extraordinary and un- 
philosophical procedure, it is perfectly clear that a 
reality, which is affirmed to be simply an infinite and 
eternal energy, is not God ; and it is equally clear that 
the limits imposed upon the enumeration of attributes 
were designed to exclude the doctrine of God's existence. 
This branch of the theory, therefore, with its inade- 
quate characterization of the infinite reality, is 
atheistic. 

To this it may be objected that a theological element 
is unwarrantably introduced into a purely philosophical 
discussion. This demurrer, however, cannot be admit- 
ted. There is a sphere of inquiry in which philosophy 



366 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

and theology meet and blend. It is that of ontology. 
From its very nature philosophy cannot properly be 
restricted in its inquiries to the field of natural science, 
or of mental science, or of moral science, or of logical 
science. It passes beyond the consideration of phe- 
nomena and phenomenal laws, and pushes its inquiries 
into origins and ends. It demands causes for all that 
appears to be, nor is it satisfied until it arrives at some 
ultimate cause in which all minor causes find their 
centre and bond of unity — something which is the ex- 
planation of everything else, the key of the universe. 
This is Mr. Spencer's procedure as he is a philosopher ; 
and so far he is unquestionably right. In this respect, 
he is, as to his intentions at least, incomparably superior 
to the mere positivist. He finds his fundamental reality 
in a force which is the first cause, the ultimate of ulti- 
mates. Of this force he gives the characteristics ; it is 
infinite and eternal. This is his ontology. 

~No more can theology be confined to the phenomena 
and phenomenal laws of the religious nature, to religious 
states, acts and duties. It also makes a demand for 
origins and ends. Why not ? Is it not as well as phil- 
osophy entitled to institute these inquiries ? Now, the 
Bible has its first cause, its ultimate of ultimates. This, 
with Mr. Spencer, it describes as an infinite and eternal 
energy, but it goes beyond him and affirms that it is also 
a spiritual, intelligent, personal, creative being. This 
is its ontology. Let it be supposed, for the moment, that 
it made no pretension to be a supernatural revelation, 
but to be simply the recorded results of human specu- 
lation, as the agnostic assumes it to be. On that suppo- 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 367 

sition, it would, so far as its cosmogony is concerned, be 
merely a philosophy. It would be an ontological specu- 
lation. Where, then, would be the difference, with 
reference to ontology, between philosophy and theology ? 
JSTone whatever, from the point of view of the nature of 
their procedures. The difference would only consist in 
the doctrines they might enounce in regard to the ulti- 
mate being and its relation to the universe. Concerning 
their views of the conceded fundamental reality, the 
biblical ontologist and the agnostic ontologist join issue. 
The one affirms God, the other excludes him. The con- 
test, upon the hypothesis made, is legitimate and fair. 
The contestants occupy the same field, raise the same 
questions and address themselves to their solution with 
the same rational organs of investigation. Where, then, 
is the unwarrantableness, where the possibility, of intro- 
ducing a distinctively theological element into the 
discussion — a Dens ex maclmia ? According to the con- 
tention of the agnostic himself, it would be reason 
debating with reason upon the field of reason ; and the 
biblical ontologist confidently undertakes to prove, upon 
rational grounds, that the atheistic position of the 
agnostic is irrational. The objection to his doing this 
because he is called a theologian is simply ad captandum. 
Unfrock him, and you but strip him for the fight in the 
lists of philosophy. The ontology of the Bible is cer- 
tainly somebody's ontology, as much so as the agnostic's 
is his. The fact of its existence cannot be denied. 
There it is in black and white, a phenomenal reality. It 
must be met. It bestrides the path of the agnostic and 
disputes his passage. To treat it with affected contempt 



368 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

may be convenient, but would argue an arrogant conceit 
ill-befitting a philosopher; to go round it would infer 
a timidity as little becoming a hero; and to ignore it 
would stamp one no scientific registrar of facts. 

There are two general aspects in which the Bible may 
be contemplated, which are obvious upon the slightest 
inspection of its contents. The one is that in which it 
claims to state natural truths, the other that in which it 
professes to enounce redemptive truths. Let us limit 
our attention to the first of these aspects. Either the 
Bible as claiming to state natural truths is not a super- 
natural revelation, or it is. If it be contended that it is 
not, that contention could not affect the fact that it does 
claim to state natural truths. It would remain true that 
it furnishes an ontology. To say, then, that the appeal 
to it, in that respect, is illegitimate, because a profess- 
edly hyper-physical element is introduced, would be to 
speak without meaning. Ex hypothesis an authority is 
invoked which would be purely natural ; but before the 
agnostic is entitled to take the ground that the Bible, so 
far as it claims to state natural truths, is not a super- 
natural revelation, he must overthrow all the evidences 
to the contrary. To assume the fact would be unscien- 
tific and unphilosophical. It is sublimely preposterous 
for the agnostic to make that assumption. The ontology 
of the Bible chronologically preceded his. It professes, 
as his does not, to be supported by a tremendous mass 
of miraculous, and, therefore, supernatural evidence. It 
has commanded the suffrages of by far the most enlight- 
ened part of the human race, and, despite all opposition, 
it is daily increasing the number of its adherents, and 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 369 

announces its purpose to overcome every enemy and 
capture the world. It cannot, therefore, be dismissed 
with a sneer. It is no bare negation. It is a positive 
resisting force which menaces the agnostic. In reply to 
his declaration : I do not know whether there be a God — 
a declaration of ignorance — it proclaims its positive 
knowledge of God, and proclaims it from the house-tops 
with a tone of triumphant confidence which resounds in 
every tongue of earth, and is tremulous with no presage 
of defeat. It challenges the agnostic to try conclusions 
on the field of battle, and when he dismisses its heralds 
with their beards shaven and their nakedness exposed, it 
avenges the indignity by storming his strongholds. Fas 
est ah hoste doceri; and if Mr. Spencer would deign to 
hearken to the counsel of a foe, he would prefix to his 
ponderous and growing system a refutation of the evi- 
dences which sustain the claim of the Bible to be a 
supernatural revelation, or at least not die until he had 
appended to it such a refutation. Let him, in this 
regard, imitate the example of the English deists. May- 
hap his success will be greater than theirs. As it is, 
while he fondly imagines that, with his Medusa's head — 
the knowable unknowable — advanced to the front, he is 
pushing on to ultimate victory, he leaves behind him an 
undefeated army, is exposed to continual attacks from 
an enemy that hangs on his flanks, and is destined to 
encounter an innumerable and still unconquered host 
before him with its entrenchments stretched across his 
road. Mr. Spencer can only complete his system by this 
negative work of demolition. Otherwise, its positive 
bulk, its enormous size, will only enhance the danger of 



370 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

a catastrophe. The more he elevates the pile, the more 
will it topple to a fall. 

In rehuttal of this demand made upon him, the ag- 
nostic will, no doubt, say that the requirement is as 
absurd as it is arbitrary ; that the intrinsic merits of a 
theory are those by which it must be judged, and that, 
if a theory is in itself better than another, it deserves, 
on that account, to be preferred, and, from the nature 
of the case, displaces the other. The fittest must survive. 
In the abstract, it is conceivable that this rule of judg- 
ment would hold. Were the circumstances attending 
two rival theories the same or analogous, their intrinsic 
merits would constitute the basis of comparison between 
them. Here, however, we have a concrete case in which 
the circumstances environing two competing doctrines 
are vastly different. One of them claims that in addi- 
tion to the intrinsic probability of its truth arising from 
its internal qualities, there is the extrinsic proof, 
amounting to certainty, which is furnished by historical 
evidence. The biblical ontology makes this claim, and, 
further, it professes that this historical evidence evinces 
the fact of supernatural intervention. This claim to 
extrinsic proof of the highest character the advocate of 
the agnostic" theory must rebut. He will reply that his 
theory is supported by the uniformity of nature; but 
were this allegation admitted — and it is not, for it begs 
the question — still one clear instance of proved miracu- 
lous and supernatural interposition, invading the known 
course of nature, would wreck his method of proof . One 
exception to the uniform course of nature would destroy 
the supposition of its absolute uniformity, as one crook 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 371 

in a line which has been straight for ever so great a 
distance would upset the hypothesis of its straightness. 
The only resort of the agnostic is, with Strauss and the 
pantheists, to deny the possibility of the miracle. A 
single instance of miraculous fact, however, would nega- 
tive his hypothesis of the antecedent impossibility of 
miracles. Let the agnostic lay aside his colored glasses 
for a while, and dispassionately consider the prophetic 
declaration in the thirtieth chapter of Ezekiel: "There 
shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt," and he 
may be convinced that there is such an instance. There 
are many more like it, but ah uno disce omnes. It is not 
intended to enter into the merits of the argument. It is 
only designed to signalize the logical necessity resting 
upon the agnostic, not only to prove his own ontology, 
but also to disprove the claim which the ontology of the 
Bible makes to be supported by historical evidence of 
its supernatural origin. Failing that, his system, how- 
ever imposing, may be likened to "a parable in the 
mouth of fools," and a certain domestic bird, both of 
which are noted for standing on one leg; or, to speak 
more technically, it will afford an illustration, on a 
gigantic scale, of a violation of the destructive disjunc- 
tive conditional syllogism. 

If, on the other hand, the Bible as claiming to state 
natural truths is a supernatural revelation, there is an 
end of the question: agnosticism is nullified. 

3. The questions arise, What right has one, who has 
not devoted himself to scientific pursuits (in the common 
English acceptation of scientific) to discuss a system 
which bases itself upon the conclusions of science ? Is 



372 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

he not unfitted, to the office which he undertakes ? These 
questions are pertinent, and require serious answers. 
The treatment of facts may be regarded in several 
aspects. First, one may content himself with the obser- 
vation of facts, including their physical and natural 
relations, and the careful registration of the results of 
that personal scrutiny. In his case the consciousness, 
which is common to men, becomes intensified in its 
relation to facts. The spontaneous consciousness, by 
an effort of will, is arrested in its natural course, and 
detained in connection with phenomena. In a word, 
attention is fixed upon phenomenal facts. Investigation 
ensues. The recorded results of this investigation are 
properly denominated scientific. Secondly, one may go 
on, and, in addition to this careful study of facts, and 
the record of its results, he may proceed to consider the 
logical relations of the facts to each other — that is, those 
relations which are conceived as grounding their syn- 
thetic arrangement into a system — and by analysis, 
abstraction and generalization, may attempt their classi- 
fication. In this case, he applies, it is true, the organ 
of logic to the data of observation and experiment ; but 
the systematized arrangement of the facts which is 
accomplished- is also properly regarded as falling under 
the designation of science. Indeed, this may be consid- 
ered as science in the truest sense of the term. Classifi- 
cation is the legitimate end for which research was 
instituted. 

Now, if one, without an original observation of facts, 
should criticise the reported results of those who were 
original observers, it is evident that he would act not 



Spestcek's Agnostic Philosophy. 373 

only illegitimately, but foolishly. He would pit igno- 
rance against knowledge ; but when the results of origi- 
nal investigation have been put upon record, and one 
should patiently, candidly and thoroughly examine that 
record, it is difficult to see why he is not entitled to pass 
judgment upon the competency of such classifications 
as may have been made. He is in possession of the 
materials upon which a judgment may be formed, ma- 
terials derived from the original observers themselves, 
and he is as much justified in using his logic as were 
those observers theirs. Upon this principle Mr. Spencer 
himself, if I be not mistaken, professes in great measure 
to proceed. Having been only to a limited extent an 
actual experimenter, he derives his information of phe- 
nomenal facts and their physical relations from those 
whom he regards as able and trustworthy observers. 
Using their reports concerning the facts, he makes, in a 
broad sense at least, his own classifications and con- 
structs his own system. He would seem to have been, 
by consent, if not by express agreement, nominated to 
that office by the school to which he belongs. While, 
however, these things are so, it is not the purport of this 
brief paper to challenge Mr. Spencer's classifications. 
With his statements of facts, and with his scientific 
arrangement of facts, it is not principally concerned, 
except in regard to his doctrine of the relativity of know- 
ledge, and the allegations of fact which it involves ; and 
that theory has, in the main, been already criticised; 
but— 

Thirdly, one may transcend the strictly scientific 
functions which have been indicated; he may pass bo- 



374 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

jond the boundaries which circumscribe what is com- 
monly designated science, as the complement of empirical 
knowledge, and undertake to philosophize. He then 
enters upon the domain of philosophical knowledge as 
contradistinguished to empirical. This he may do both 
as regards natural and mental science, viewed as the 
observers and classifiers of physical and intellectual phe- 
nomena. As soon as this function is assumed, the 
procedure is one by which inferences are derived from 
phenomenal facts as empirically known. In a word, one 
begins to construct an ontology. This Mr. Spencer does. 
He is both a scientific man and a philosopher. It is not 
by any means designed to convey the impression that in 
this he acts illegitimately. On the contrary, the consti- 
tution of man is such that it is hard to see how such a 
course can be avoided. One may, as has already been 
remarked, refrain from giving expression to philo- 
sophical inferences from scientific facts, and purposely 
confine himself to the function of recording the results 
of observation and logical classification; but, as a 
thinker, how can he restrain the spontaneous tendency 
of the mind to seek for causes, and to pursue the quest 
for some ultimate principle of unity? and, if, by his 
very make, he is impelled to do this, his right must be 
conceded to give utterance to the judgments he has been 
led to form. The mind is one, and its unity, if it does 
not enforce the necessity of developing all of its funda- 
mental laws, at least, furnishes a warrant to proceed in 
the actual development of them all. The same man 
who is scientific is also metaphysical, although by dis- 
position or education, or both combined, he may be pre- 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 375 

dominantly one or the other. It is true that the scien- 
tific man is apt to be a poor metaphysician, and the 
metaphysician likely to be a poor scientific man, for a 
universal genius possessed of all learning is a rarity, if 
not an impossibility. Bacon was no exception to this 
rule; but one's right to be both a scientific man and a 
metaphysician cannot be disputed. He is free to try his 
powers in both directions, and, if he please, to take the 
enormous risks of the trial. Possibly he may prove to 
be the universal genius, and master of all knowledge. 
The fact that so glorious a diadem has never yet been 
worn does not necessarily infer that it never will be. 

The quarrel, then, is not with Mr. Spencer's claim to 
be both scientific and philosophical; it is with the 
doctrines of his philosophy. One has the same right to 
discuss his inferences from phenomenal facts as he has 
to make them, to derive his knowledge of facts from 
others as well as Mr. Spencer has ; yea, to get his infor- 
mation from Mr. Spencer himself; and is no more 
bound, in order to be qualified for the discussion, to be 
an experimenter and expert in science than Mr. Spencer 
was. The meeting is on the field of ontology, and upon 
equal terms. The territory contended for is not that 
which is covered by Mr. Spencer's mass of scientific 
statements ; it is the narrow one of inferences. The 
issue is definite. Upon inferential grounds he excludes 
the affirmation of God's existence; upon inferential 
grounds his atheistic position will be disputed. No pro- 
fession is made of neutrality of mind in relation to the 
question involved. When one has examined the evidence 
in a case and has reached settled conclusions, the time 



376 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

for inquiry is past. The attempt to destroy his inner- 
most convictions brings on a death-grapple with the 
assailant. The design of the discussion, therefore, is to 
impeach the agnostic system at the bar of reason, and to 
convict it of self-contradiction and folly. The challenge 
comes from the agnostic side ; and, although the weapon 
of defence may be but a pebble, it will be slung at the 
forehead of the Goliath who hesitates not to defy the 
living, personal, creative God, to treat with undisguised 
contempt the proofs of his existence, and to enthrone in 
his room a blind force compelled by a blind necessity 
to gender all things by a blind evolution. 

4. Mr. Spencer denominates his system a "System of 
Philosophy," and it is so characterized by his adherents 
and critics. The questions then occur, To what place 
in the ranks of philosophies shall it be assigned ? or, Is 
it a wholly new and peculiar philosophy ? If Sir Wil- 
liam Hamilton's division be accepted, and there is per- 
haps no better, philosophers are distributable first into 
the two general classes of nihilists, who deny substance, 
and substantialists, who admit it. Under the class 
nihilists there are no species. The substantialists again 
are divisible into two classes, monists and dualists, or 
those who allow of but one substance, and those who 
affirm two. The monists are of three sorts : materialists, 
who make the one substance material; idealists, who 
make it spiritual, and absolute identitists, who make it 
neither predominantly material nor spiritual, but 
equally material and spiritual, both elements being in 
absolute equipoise with each other. The class dualists 
are distributable into two subordinate classes: hypo- 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 377 

thetical dualists ( hypothetical realists, cosmothetic 
idealists, representative peroeptionists) on the one hand, 
and absolute dualists (absolute or natural realists, im- 
mediate perceptionists) on the other. 

Mr. Spencer is not a nihilist, for he admits both phe- 
nomenal and transcendental reality. He is not a dualist 
of either kind, for he repels the imputation to him of 
dualism. In replying to a critic of his views he says : 

" Yet he either knows, or has ample means of knowing, that I 
deny every such second cause: indeed, he has himself classed me 
as an opponent of dualism." x 

It is not necessary to adduce any further testimony 
than this to prove that he does not consider himself as a 
dualist. He professes to be neither a materialist nor a 
spiritualist. He remarks: 

" The interpretation of all phenomena in terms of Matter, 
Motion, and Force, is nothing more than the reduction of our 
complex symbols of thought to the simplest symbols; and when 
the equation has been brought to its lowest terms, the symbols 
remain symbols still. Hence the reasonings contained in the fore- 
going pages afford no support to either of the antagonist hypothe- 
ses respecting the ultimate nature of things. Their implications 
are no more materialistic than they are spiritualistic, and no 
more spiritualistic than they are materialistic. Any argument 
which is apparently furnished to either hypothesis, is neutralized 
by as good an argument furnished to the other." 2 

Is Mr. Spencer, then, an advocate of absolute iden- 
tity ? The answer will be, No, or Yes, in correspondence 
with the meaning attached to the terms of the question. 
If the meaning be, is he a monist, in the sense that he 
holds to but one substance, equally material and spirit- 

1 Letter appended to his Principles of Biology, Vol. I., p. 491. 
3 Ibid., pp. 491, 492. 



378 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ual? Mr. Spencer, if he is not misunderstood, would 
answer in the negative. If the meaning be, is he an 
advocate of absolute identity, in a sense peculiar to him- 
self, he would reply in the affirmative. He is a monist, 
holding to absolute identity, according to his own con- 
ception of those terms. What is his conception? He 
claims to be a monist, in the sense, not that he holds to 
one substance, but to one ultimate force. Of this one 
force, eternally immanent in all things, matter and 
motion are but the forms in which it expresses itself, or, 
to use Mr. Spencer's language, the modes by which it 
is conditioned. These conditioning modes, so far as 
manifested to us, are symbolized by our thoughts. We 
think them in terms of matter and motion. He cannot, 
therefore, be reduced, if we allow his own professions, to 
either of the classes into which Hamilton, and one is 
apt to suppose reason itself, exhaustively distributes 
philosophers. Indeed, he claims a new and exceptional 
position. He entitles his perhaps most celebrated work, 
The First Principles of a New System of Philosophy. 
He is the originator of a new philosophy. 

It may be thought that Mr. Spencer has been incor- 
rectly represented as not being a substantialist. That 
the characterization is not unjust can, it is believed, be 
made apparent by his own authority. He denies, or 
rather ridicules, the existence of moral substance. 
Speaking of "three different suppositions respecting the 
origin of things," which he pronounces "literally un- 
thinkable," he says : 

"Experiment proves that the elements of these hypotheses 
cannot even be put together in consciousness; and we can enter- 
tain them only as we entertain such pseud-ideas as a square fluid 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 379 

and a moral substance — only by abstaining from the endeavor to 
render them into actual thoughts." x 

So much for moral substance. H© denies and scouts 
it; but if he rejects moral substance, he is logically 
bound to reject mental substance, notwithstanding the 
fact that he expressly admits the latter; for he justly 
reasons that if there be the quality of intelligence there 
must be a recondite substance which it manifests. By 
parity of reasoning, as he concedes the quality of 
morality, he ought to admit an occult substance which 
is manifested by it. As, however, he repudiates a sub- 
stance which is moral, he is under the logical necessity 
of denying a substance which is mental. From his point 
of view, a mental substance ought to be as ridiculous as 
"a square fluid." The truth is that he does not use the 
term substance in the sense in which substantialists em- 
ploy it. He means by it force. This does not save him 
from inconsistency, for if there be an unknowable 
mental force, for the same reason there ought to be an 
unknowable moral force; but, allowing him his own 
illogical position, that there is a mental substance which 
is the unknown substrate of what he calls mind, it is 
clear that it is not a substance, in the ordinary accepta- 
tion of the word. It is held by him to be force — a mere 
mode of the primordial force, which, as the ultimate of 
ultimates, is immanent in all things, in things called 
material and in things called mental. It is one of the 
forms in which the ultimate force is by evolution de- 
veloped. It is evident, then, that Mr. Spencer only 
holds that there is mental substance, so far as he holds 

1 First Principles, pp. 35, 36. 



380 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

that force is substance, or substance is force. That this 
is his doctrine might be shown by a multitude of quota- 
tions. Let one suffice: 

"And this brings us to the true conclusion implied throughout 
the foregoing pages — the conclusion that it is one and the same 
Ultimate Reality which is manifested to us subjectively and ob- 
jectively. For, while the nature of that which is manifested under 
either form proves to be inscrutable, the order of its manifesta- 
tions throughout all mental phenomena proves to be the same as 
the order of its manifestations throughout all material phenom- 
ena. The Law of Evolution holds of the inner world as it does of 
the outer world." 1 

The case is plain. Mind is motion; motion is force 
moving. All motion is but the effect and manifestation 
of the ultimate force. Mind, consequently, is the 
evolved motion of the ultimate force. To say that mind 
as motion is but the known manifestation of an unknown 
postulate is but to say that the unknown postulate is a 
force manifested by motion. Phenomenal or unphe- 
nomenal, mind is force moving or non-moving. Mr. 
Spencer can call the unperceived mental postulate sub- 
stance if he please, but he means force ; and until force 
and substance are proved to be identical, he cannot be 
ranked as a substantialist. 

The same is. true of matter. Mr. Spencer represents it 
as a mode, a form of expression, a something, of the 
ultimate force which is immanent and operative in the 
universe. It is the primordial force evolved in a certain 
way. All may be summed up in what he says of matter 
as relative and absolute: 

"Whence it becomes manifest that our experience of force is 
that out of which the idea of Matter is built. Matter, as opposing 

1 Prin. Psychology, Vol. I., p. 627. 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 381 

our muscular energies, being immediately present to consciousness 
in terms of force; and its occupancy of Space being known by an 
abstract of experiences originally given in terms of force; it 
follows that forces, standing in certain correlations, form the 
whole content of our idea of Matter. 

"Such being our cognition of the relative reality, what are we 
to say of the absolute reality? We can only say that it is some 
mode of the Unknowable, related to the Matter we know, as cause 
to effect." x 

It is obvious that Mr. Spencer's material substance is 
material force. He is entitled to his own nomenclature, 
but he speaks a different dialect from the family of 
substantialists. 

What, then, is Mr. Spencer ? He is not a nihilist, nor 
a substantialist, either as dualist or monist, either as ma- 
terialist, or idealist, or absolute identitist. He is an 
energist. His system assumes to be a system of energism. 
His philosophy is the philosophy of force. Whether it 
has the force of philosophy, is another question. As a 
theory of knowledge it is that of the knowable unknow- 
able ; as an ontology it is that of blind force, proceeding 
by the law of evolution. As a physicist, he contends 
for an immaterial matter; as a psychologist for an 
unintelligent intelligence. No doubt, however, his 
system has plenty of force in it. As the jurist of the 
universe, he would have it governed by the law : Might 
makes right. Force is everything. Force circum- 
gyrates, evolves, dissipates, equilibrates, and dissolves 
the universe; and then circumgyrates, evolves, dissi- 
pates, equilibrates, and dissolves it again; and so on 
and on, through this law of roundaboutness, it operates 

1 First Principles, p. 167. 



382 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

in saecula saeculorum. Yes, Mr. Spencer has excogi- 
tated a new system. His philosophy is force, his the- 
ology is force, his god is force. The long ascending 
series of philosophies and theologies have evolved into 
a climax of intellectual speculation "beyond which, as 
ultimate, the human intelligence cannot go ; and unless 
the human species is on the point of being transmuted 
into one of grander and loftier powers adequate more 
fully to grasp the unknowable, the present dispensation 
of the universe must be at the apex of the evolving 
process, and is henceforward destined, through the dis- 
sipation and equilibration of force, to sink into dissolu- 
tion. Whether the succeeding dispensation, which shall, 
by rotary force, emerge from the nebulous debris of the 
present, will evolve a newer and higher philosophy, it 
might bo rash to conjecture. It may be that no higher 
is inwrapped in the possibilities of the immeasurable 
future, and that the philosophic culmination of evolution 
has been reached. Certainly no human intellect of this 
present time can imagine anything sublimer than the 
consciousness of absolute mystery. 1 

5. All philosophy pursues the quest for ultimate unity. 
It cannot rest satisfied short of its attainment. Mr. 
Spencer is, it is believed, recognized as the most promi- 
nent philosopher of the school of evolution. It is true 
that to Professor James Sully was assigned the distin- 
guished office of writing that section of the article in the 
Encyclopedia Britannica on Evolution, which treats of 
"Evolution in Philosophy," and from this circumstance 
it may be inferred that he ranks high as a philosopher 

1 First Principles. 



Spencek's Agnostic Philosophy. 383 

of evolution; but Professor Sully himself, in that 
article, says of Mr. Spencer, "The thinker who has done 
more than any one else to elaborate a consistent phil- 
osophy of evolution on a scientific basis is Mr. Herbert 
Spencer." E"ow, Mr. Spencer more than once justly 
describes philosophy as the "unifier of science," * and 
expresses himself very precisely to that effect in these 
words: "To bring the definition to its simplest and 
clearest form: Knowledge of the lowest kind is un- 
unified knowledge; science is partially -unified know- 
ledge; philosophy is completely-unified knowledge." 
We are justified, then, in asking of Mr. Spencer, as the 
philosophical unifier of science, what the ultimate unity 
is which he has reached. To get the answer to this 
question we are obliged to contemplate his philosophy 
in two aspects — aspects imposed upon it by himself — 
first, as a theory of knowledge, and, secondly, as an 
ontological scheme. 

(1.) In his First Principles he begins with a disserta- 
tion, first, on the "Unknowable," and, secondly, on the 
"Laws of the Knowable." In the first part of this dis- 
cussion he makes the attempt to effect a reconciliation 
of science and religion, upon the unknowable as a postu- 
late fundamental and common to both. Now, it must 
be evident to every one, except Mr. Spencer, that an 
effort to reconcile two systems which he regards as 
conflicting, upon any other ground than upon one which 
involves some element of knowledge — some known prin- 
ciple — possessed by both, would be as extraordinary an 
enterprise as was ever undertaken by man ; but, as he 

1 First Principles, p. 171. 



384 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

insists upon the unknowable as the only possible basis 
of a mutual understanding, there would present itself to 
him a tougher difficulty than the reconciliation of science 
and religion, as he views them; it would be the diffi- 
culty of effecting a reconciliation of the unknowable and 
the knowable. They must not only be reconciled with 
each other, but there must be some method by which 
they shall be reduced to ultimate unity. It would not 
do to say that this is a demand of philosophy, and Mr. 
Spencer limits the scope of philosophy to the knowable ; 
for call his speculations in regard to the unknowable 
what one may, they are certainly of the nature of infer- 
ences, as could easily be shown by his own express 
admissions, and they are, therefore, philosophical 
whether Mr. Spencer concedes the fact or not. He 
cannot legitimately term some of his inferences philo- 
sophical, and deny the appellation to other inferences 
which he makes. Further, his inferences as to the 
existence of the unknowable have, in his judgment, force 
and reality enough to constitute a platform upon which 
science and religion can stand together, and shake hands 
with each other. Surely, he would not denominate such 
inferences theological. What else can they be but philo- 
sophical? Either the unknowable is given by Mr. 
Spencer's science or by his philosophy. By his science 
is out of the question; therefore, by his philosophy: 
this is the only possible conclusion. Further still, if 
Mr. Spencer limits his philosophy to the knowable, as 
he defines knowable, it goes no farther than the scientific 
knowledge of the phenomenal, since he says force, even 
as relative, passes understanding ; and if relative force 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 385 

is included in the knowable, his philosophy would stop 
short of absolute force, and would, therefore, fail to 
reach ultimate unity. 

But, leaving out of view the question with reference 
to the term 'philosophy, we cannot fail to observe that 
Mr. Spencer assumes to have wrought out a "system," 
a "new system," which consists of two parts — the un- 
knowable and the knowable. E"ow it is fair to demand 
unity in this system. Otherwise, it is not a system ; it is 
an incoherent jumble of materials. There must be some 
point at which the unknowable and the knowable shall 
come together, and be ultimately unified. That point 
can be no other than one which shall make the unknow- 
able knowable, the knowable unknowable. Mr. Spen- 
cer's system, therefore, at last heads up in the flat 
contradiction of the unknowable-knowable, or the 
knowable-unknowable. So much for the quest of unity 
in his theory of knowledge. 

(2.) It has already been sufficiently pointed out that 
Mr. Spencer professes to be neither exclusively a ma- 
terialist nor exclusively a spiritualist. He acknowledges 
both matter and mind, and speaks of the substance of 
each — the fundamental postulate of the manifestations 
of each ; and it has been shown that he represents both 
as modes of the ultimate force immanent and operative 
in all things, our conceptions of matter and mind being 
but symbols of those modes of force which we call ma- 
terial and mental substance. Here, it must be confessed, 
that he collects matter and mind into unity upon force. 
Both, he holds, are modes of force, and these different 
modes of force condition one and the same ultimate 



386 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

force. They are not- two different kinds of force, but 
different faces by which the same force is manifested. 
This looks very much like unity. His ontological system 
— and his apparent aversion to the term ontology can 
make no real difference — his ontological system would 
seem to be characterized by ultimate unity. This neces- 
sitates the question, Has Mr. Spencer reduced his 
scheme to ultimate unity? and that question calls up 
another, Will his alleged ultimate principle of unity do 
what he claims for it ? 

These questions must be answered in the negative, 
upon the incontestable ground that an unknown and 
unknowable principle of unity can be no principle of 
unity. Mr. Spencer explicitly settles this matter in two 
marvellous ways. Speaking of the difficulties which 
beset "the man of science," he says: 

" Supposing him in every case able to resolve the appearances, 
properties, and movements of things, into manifestations of Force 
in Space and Time; he still finds that Force, Space, and Time 
pass all understanding. Similarly, though the analysis of mental 
actions may finally bring him down to sensations, as the original 
materials out of which all thought is woven[!], yet he is little 
forwarder; for he can give no account of sensations themselves 
or of that something which is conscious of sensations. Objective 
and subjective things he thus ascertains to be alike inscrutable in 
their substance and genesis. In all directions his investigations 
eventually bring him face to face with an insoluble enigma." 1 

Here Mr. Spencer maintains that relative forces are, 
in themselves, apart from their phenomenal manifesta- 
tions, inscrutable. They pass all understanding. If 
they could be conceived they would, in some degree, be 
understood. If they pass all understanding, they must 

1 First Prin., pp. 66, 67. 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 387 

be inconceivable. This is affirmed of material and 
mental forces, which are but conditioning modes of the 
absolute and ultimate force. 

Of course, if this is true of relative force, it is 
a fortiori true of absolute force. There is no need to 
cite passages in order to evince what Mr. Spencer every- 
where asserts — that the ultimate force is unknowable. 
He pronounces it "not a relative, but an absolute mys- 
tery." 1 

How, then, can what Mr. Spencer calls force, although 
he professes to know nothing about it, although unknow- 
able and absolutely mysterious, be a principle of unity 
to which his philosophic system is ultimately reducible ? 
Does philosophy, which assumes to be an illustrious form 
of knowledge, which Mr. Spencer himself not incor- 
rectly designates as the "unifier of science," logically 
gathering up its multitudinous facts into splendid gen- 
eralizations, and referring them to original causes and 
all-pervading laws — does philosophy ultimate in a 
blank? Is this to unify science — to affirm of its last 
conclusions that they are incapable of being known, to 
guess at its final principle ? 

It will not do to say that Mr. Spencer restricts the 
office of philosophy to relative force ; for he pronounces 
relative force unknowable. The question would be, 
How can philosophy subordinately unify the facts of 
science upon a relative force, of which the unifying 
organ knows nothing? And if his philosophy, when 
discharging a confessedly legitimate function, cannot 
reach subordinate unity in unknowable relative prin- 

1 First Prin., p. 46. 



388 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ciples, how can Mr. Spencer's system, as a whole, attain 
to ultimate unity in an unknowable absolute principle ? 

ISTor will it do to say that, although we do not, and 
cannot, know force, relative or absolute, our knowledge 
being confined to its phenomenal manifestations, yet 
we are " indefinitely conscious " of it. Either this 
indefinite consciousness of it is some knowledge or it is 
not. If it is, Mr. Spencer is reduced to self-contradic- 
tion; for he would affirm that we possess some know- 
ledge of what is unknowable. If it is not, the existence 
of force, relative or absolute, being altogether unknown, 
would be a mere supposition ; and it is clear that such a 
supposition would not be sufficient to ground the exist- 
ence of an ultimate principle of unity to which the 
known facts of the universe are sought to be reduced. 

Further, Mr. Spencer's attempted solution of the 
difficulty attending the apprehension of unphenomenal, 
transcendental existence, by attributing that apprehen- 
sion to an indefinite consciousness, which, at the same 
time, is not knowledge', is utterly inconsistent with 
another solution of the same difficulty which he fre- 
quently suggests, without appearing to perceive the 
incongruity between them, or making any effort to 
harmonize them. He maintains that relative force, 
material and mental, as modes conditioning the absolute 
force, and the absolute force itself, are postulates made 
necessary by the empirical observation of phenomenal 
facts. We cannot know mental substance, we cannot 
know material substance, but they are fundamental 
postulates. Much less can we know the absolute, the 
ultimate reality, but it is the inevitable postulate alike 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 389 

of science and religion; here they meet and kiss each 
other. 

The question occurs, By what organ are these postu- 
lates enforced ? A postulate is something demanded. 
These postulates of Mr. Spencer are manifestly things 
which are necessarily inferred from or supposed by 
certain other things which are given. Given certain 
mental phenomena, we necessarily infer or suppose 
mental substance. So with material phenomena. We 
do not know the mental or material force which is a 
conditioning mode of the absolute force, nor do we know 
the absolute force, but we necessarily infer or suppose 
their existence — we postulate them. Now, what does 
the inferring or supposing — the postulating ? It surely 
cannot be consciousness. It is not its business to infer 
or suppose. It immediately knows. The objects upon 
which it terminates are percepts. It never infers or 
supposes anything. If another power makes the infer- 
ence or supposition, consciousness apprehends the 
mental act; but it does not originate it. It neither 
mediately nor immediately infers. It is evident that 
the postulation of relative and absolute force, lying as 
they do beyond consciousness, is done by an act of 
judgment. Consciousness gives the phenomenal facts 
which necessitate their postulation, but that is all that 
consciousness accomplishes. Some other power must 
form the judgment, occasioned by these empirical facts, 
that occult force exists. It is not needful now to show 
what the power is which infers, supposes — postulates 
transcendental reality. It has already been evinced that 
as consciousness cannot do it, and as thought cannot 



390 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

transcend consciousness, thought cannot do it ; and that 
it is the believing power which forms these judgments 
as to existences that lie beyond the reach of consciousness 
and thought. They are faith- judgments ; and faith- 
judgments are as valid grounds of knowledge as are 
thought- j udgments. 

But what it is of importance to signalize here is that 
consciousness, indefinite or definite, cannot do the postu- 
lation of relative and absolute force, which Mr. Spencer 
admits to be a necessary procedure of intelligence. If 
this be so, he utterly fails to show how his transcendental 
realities of relative and absolute force becomes appre- 
hensible — how we become aware of their existence. If 
he attributes them to indefinite consciousness, and at 
the same time asserts that they are necessarily inferred, 
he employs affirmations which are inconsistent with each 
other, and yet makes no attempt to reconcile them. His 
indefinite consciousness cannot give ultimate unity: it 
were absurd to think so ; and he does not tell us how or 
why we postulate it. 

The conclusion is that Mr. Spencer fails to reduce 
his system to ultimate unity. The system, as such, is, 
therefore, a failure. It does not advance one step be- 
yond positivism ; for he not only asserts that we can 
know nothing of the absolute or ultimate force, but that 
we can know nothing of relative force, of matter and 
mental substance. What, then, can we know beyond the 
phenomenal ? Is not this the position of the positivist ? 
Mr. Spencer vehemently repudiates the positivist posi- 
tion in regard to transcendental reality, and then 
elaborately argues in its favor. He reminds one of the 



Speis t cek's Agnostic Philosophy. 391 

mother described by Shakespeare, who abuses her child, 
but when another follows her example, hugs it to her 
bosom, and fondly caresses it. 

6. Let us examine Mr. Spencer's doctrine ( ?) concern- 
ing what he calls the fundamental reality, the inscru- 
table power, the absolute force, the ultimate force, the 
first or ultimate cause, the ultimate of ultimates. 

(1.) With reference to the knowledge of its nature, 
he contradicts himself. 

First. He affirms that we can know nothing about it 
— that it is unknowable. He labors to show that this is 
the final conclusion both of religion and science, and 
that it is upon this agnostic conclusion a reconciliation 
between religion and science becomes possible. They 
agree in affirming an "absolute mystery." They are, in 
this relation, joint confessors of absolute ignorance. It 
is unnecessary to furnish citations from Mr. Spencer's 
writings to prove that he holds this position. He asserts 
or implies it everywhere. 

Secondly. He affirms the existence of this unknow- 
able reality. Some passages will be quoted in proof 
of this : 

" To sum up this somewhat too elaborate argument : We have 
seen how, in the very assertion, that all our knowledge, properly 
so-called, is Relative, there is involved the assertion that there 
exists a Non-relative. . . . We have seen that unless a real 
Non-relative or Absolute be postulated, the Relative itself becomes 
absolute; and so brings the argument to a contradiction. And on 
contemplating the process of thought, we have equally seen how 
impossible it is to get rid of the consciousness of an actuality 
lying behind appearances; and how, from this impossibility, 
results our indestructible belief in that actuality." x 

1 First Prin., pp. 96, 97. 



392 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

" Though the Absolute cannot in any manner or degree be 
known, in the strict sense of knowing, yet we find that its positive 
existence is a necessary datum of consciousness; that so long as 
consciousness continues, we cannot for an instant rid it of this 
datum; and that thus the belief which this datum constitutes[!]' 
has a higher warrant than any other whatever." x 

" Magnetism, heat, light, etc., which were awhile since spoken 
of as so many distinct imponderables, physicists are now beginning 
to regard as different modes of manifestation of some one universal 
force; and in so doing are ceasing to think of this force as com- 
prehensible." 2 

In his First Principles he admits "the power mani- 
fested to ns through all existence," 3 frequently allows 
the existence of "an ultimate cause/' 4 and near the 
close of his discussion on the Reconciliation of Religion 
and Science, says : 

" He [that is, a member of the school which Mr. Spencer repre- 
sents], like every other man, may properly consider himself as 
one of the myriad agencies through whom works the Unknown 
Cause; and when the Unknown Cause produces in him a certain 
belief, he is thereby authorized to profess and act out that belief." 5 

Thirdly. Mr. Spencer gives us a characterization — 
a description of the attributes of — the ultimate reality. 
It is power, force, energy, cause. It is omnipotent, 
omnipresent, infinite, eternal. It is characterized by 
unity. In a comparatively recent paper he designates it 
as an infinite and eternal energy — a limitation which 
elicited a protest from Mr. Harrison. We have, then, 
an existence characterized by the attributes of infinity, 
eternity, unity, power and ubiquity. It is useless to go 
into a spasm of quotations to prove this allegation ; it is 
justified everywhere in Mr. Spencer's works. 

1 First Prin., p. 98. 2 Ibid., p. 105. 3 Ibid., p. 112. 

*Ibid. } p. 113, and elsewhere. B Ibid., p. 123. 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 393 

Now, put together these affirmations : that a thing is 
unknowable; that, nevertheless, it exists; and that it 
is characterized by certain definite attributes ; and you 
have a stupendous contradiction which must sink Mr. 
Spencer's system. No plea of indefinite consciousness, 
or of necessary postulation, or of a belief constituted of 
a datum of consciousness can avert the catastrophe. 

(2.) He is self -contradictory as to the relation of the 
ultimate reality to the origin of the universe. 

First. He declares that no hypothesis in regard to the 

origin of the universe is tenable. Referring to the 

different attempts which have been made to solve this 

problem, he says: 

"A critical examination, however, will prove not only that no 
current hypothesis is tenable, but also that no tenable hypothesis 
can be framed." x 

Secondly. He affirms that the unknowable ultimate 
force is the cause of the universe. Proof that he makes 
this affirmation has already been furnished; but that 
which causes anything originates it ; at least, that which 
is the ultimate or first cause of anything originates it. 
Is not this an hypothesis respecting the origin of the 
universe ? No hypothesis can be framed concerning it ; 
here is an hypothesis which Mr. Spencer frames con- 
cerning it. He cannot know the cause of the universe ; 
but he knows that the ultimate force is its cause. 

Thirdly. He elaborately discusses three suppositions 
which may be made respecting the origin of the universe 
— namely, either "that it is self -existent ; or that it is 
self-created ; or that it is created by an external agency." 

1 First Prin., p. 30. 



394 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

Touching these suppositions his concluding comment is 

in these words: 

" Here, then, respecting the nature of the universe, we seem 
committed to certain unavoidable conclusions. The objects and 
actions surrounding us, not less than the phenomena of our own 
consciousness, compel us to ask a cause; in our search for a cause 
we discover no resting place until we arrive at the hypothesis of a 
First Cause; and we have no alternative but to regard this First 
Cause as Infinite and Absolute. These are inferences forced upon 
us by arguments from which there appears no escape. It is hardly 
needful, however, to show those who have followed us thus far, 
how illusive are these reasonings and their results. But that it 
would tax the reader's patience to no purpose, it might easily be 
proved that the materials of which the argument is built, equally 
with the conclusions based on them, are merely symbolic concep- 
tions of the illegitimate order." x 

Here we have several first-rate contradictions. 

In the first place, he elsewhere affirms the ultimate 
force to be infinite and eternal. Of course, then, it is 
self -existent ; for, if not self-existent, it derived its 
existence from a cause preceding it ; it begun, which is 
contrary to the supposition that it is infinite and eternal ; 
but Mr. Spencer identifies the universe with the ultimate 
force. He explicitly and repeatedly says that the ulti- 
mate force is immanent in the universe, not simply as 
present and abiding in it — as theists affirm of God — but 
as being the very content of the universe. Matter, 
spirit, motion are but modes of manifestation of the 
ultimate force. They are it as manifested. He is not a 
progressionist, but distinctively an evolutionist. He 
repudiates progressionism. All things, therefore, ac- 
cording to him, are evolved out of the ultimate force; 

1 First Prin., pp. 38, 39. 



Spekcek's Agnostic Philosophy. 395 

they are relative forces modifying and manifesting the 
ultimate and absolute. It logically follows, then, that 
the universe is self-existent. Of things which are the 
same with each other, the same predication may be 
made. We have, then, the contradiction of the affirma- 
tion and the denial of the self -existence of the universe. 

Suppose that this be objected to on the ground that 
matter, spirit, motion, are but parts of the ultimate 
force, and, therefore, not liable to the same predication 
with it ; the answer would be that parts of the ultimate 
force would, on the supposition, not be self-existent, 
while that force itself is self-existent, and that position 
is self -contradictory for two reasons : first, the infinite 
can have no parts; and, second, the infinite cannot be 
partly self-existent and partly not self -existent ; but 
Mr. Spencer affirms the ultimate force to be infinite, and 
relative force to be the same with it. 

In the second place, Mr. Spencer pronounces the judg- 
ment that the first cause is infinite and absolute to be 
illusive, to be a symbolic conception of the illegitimate 
order. E"ow Mr. Spencer elsewhere maintains that the 
ultimate force is infinite and absolute. ~No matter by 
what process he reaches this conclusion, whether by 
indefinite consciousness, or belief constituted of a datum 
of consciousness, or by necessary inference, he reaches 
it and asserts it. He, therefore, affirms the contradiction 
that the conclusion to a first cause as infinite and abso- 
lute is at once illusive and valid. 

In the third place, he is not only confronted with that 
contradiction in regard to the existence of the absolute, 
but also with the contradiction that the ultimate force 



396 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

is absolute and not absolute. The absolute, according 
to him, is that which is out of all relation — at least, is 
that which, as an "absolute mystery," is not known to 
have any relation ; and yet, he maintains that all things, 
material and spiritual, are modes by which the absolute 
manifests itself. Are the modes of manifestation out 
of relation to that which they manifest ? Are they also 
out of relation to that to which the manifestation is 
made — to the conscious observers of the phenomenal 
manifestations ? This is marvellous : the absolute is 
not known to be in relation to aught else ; the absolute 
is manifested to the consciousness of all men. The 
absolute is the unconditioned and the conditioned ; it is 
the absolute and the relative. 

In the fourth place, we encounter a contradiction in 
regard to the first cause. It is almost superfluous to 
remark that the first cause and the ultimate cause are 
one and the same. It is termed ultimate when viewed 
as reached by an analytical and regressive procedure of 
the mind — it is the last cause thus attained. It is 
denominated first when contemplated as the original 
efficient, or producer, of all things. Let this be granted, 
and the contradiction becomes apparant. Mr. Spencer 
declares the "process by which a first or ultimate cause 
is reached to be illusive, and the judgment affirming it 
to be based on merely symbolic conceptions of the ille- 
gitimate order. Now he distinctly and repeatedly main- 
tains the existence of an ultimate cause of the universe. 
His ultimate force is the ultimate cause. If not, if his 
ultimate force is produced by the ultimate cause, it is 
not the ultimate force, since, ex hypothesi, it was pro- 



Speis t cee's Agnostic Philosophy. 397 

duced by the force of the ultimate cause. There would 
then he a force preceding the ultimate force, which is a 
contradiction ; but we understand Mr. Spencer as identi- 
fying the ultimate force and the ultimate cause. This 
judgment, therefore, of an ultimate cause, however 
derived, he affirms, and must regard as valid. He is 
consequently reduced to the contradiction of maintain- 
ing that the judgment of an ultimate or first cause is 
both illusive and valid. 

To this it will, no doubt, be replied that the charge 
of contradiction is based upon a misconstruction of Mr. 
Spencer's position ; that he was contending against the 
legitimacy of an argument in favor of a first cause, 
founded upon concepts as its materials — an argument 
which, using subordinate concepts, professes to arrive 
at the final concept of a first cause ; whereas, he reaches 
an ultimate cause in an entirely different way; and it 
will be said that he fairly justifies himself by the author- 
ity of the Christian philosophers, Hamilton and Mansel. 
This defence of Mr. Spencer's position is utterly vain. 

Hamilton, and especially Mansel, contended against 
the doctrine in regard to the infinite and absolute, which 
was held by the transcendental absolutists of Germany. 
The latter developed the radical fallacy of Kant, that 
the ideas of the pure reason, which give transcendental 
matter, are but higher concepts grouping into ultimate 
generalizations the concepts of the understanding which 
that faculty cannot reduce to unity. The judgments 
which affirm the infinite and absolute are concepts — 
they are the products of thought. This the British 
philosophers denied, and rightly denied. They showed 



398 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

that the mere thinking faculty, when it makes the impos- 
sible attempt to conceive the infinite, becomes entangled 
in a network of insoluble antinomies. Now did Mr. 
Spencer simply pursue the laudable end of these phi- 
losophers, no objection would here be offered to his 
position. It is true that Hamilton and Mansel, having 
accomplished this negative office, ought to have gone on, 
and applied their mighty powers to the positive 
explication and systematic arrangement of those faith- 
judgments which alone, and which legitimately, affirm 
the infinite — to have formally developed the profound 
views of Jacobi, without the errors which crippled the 
speculations of the German Plato. 

But, up to the point at which they disproved the 
absolutist assumption that it is competent to conception 
to give the infinite, they were right ; and up to that 
point Mr. Spencer is right, so far as he concurs with 
them. That being conceded, it is, on the other hand, 
idle to justify Mr. Spencer in his illegitimate extension 
of their views beyond the limit to which, as theistic and 
Christian philosophers, they meant them to be restricted. 
He uses them in an argument designed, not only to 
refute absolutism, but theism; and it can be regarded 
as nothing less than an outrage to cite Hamilton and 
Mansel as being, either explicitly or by logical inference, 
in his favor, so far as his anti-theistic position is con- 
cerned. These distinguished men denied that we can 
think an infinite first cause, as creator, but they did not 
dream of denying his existence. They affirmed it as a 
datum of faith. What conception or thought cannot do, 
the higher faculty of faith does. They impaired their 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 

posthumous influence, and left themselves exposed to 
misconstruction, by failing to show how the transcenden- 
tal judgments of faith are symbolically, but validly, 
employed by the logical faculty in the construction of the 
theistic argument. Notwithstanding this defect, their 
authority is abusively invoked in an effort to prove that, 
because the theistic argument is not composed of con- 
cepts as its materials, it is illusive and invalid. It doe9 
not, therefore, at all help Mr. Spencer to defend him 
by saying that he was contending against the legitimacy 
of an argument in favor of a first cause founded upon 
concepts as its materials, and by alleging that, in this 
respect, he is supported by the splendid authority of 
Hamilton and Mansel. 

Further, although Mr. Spencer may have succeeded 
in showing that an argument for a first or ultimate 
cause founded upon concepts is illusive, he himself 
professes to hold the existence of a first or ultimate 
cause. The question is, How does he ground its affirma- 
tion ? If he says that it is a necessary postulate, the 
question is, What is it that postulates ? He is compelled 
to answer, The thinking faculty; but that faculty pro- 
ceeds by concepts as its materials, and so he is reduced 
to the contradiction of affirming and denying that we 
reach the first or ultimate cause by conception. If he 
says that we are indefinitely conscious of it, he is embar- 
rassed by his admission of the Hamiltonian canon: 
thought cannot transcend consciousness ; which certainly 
implies that thought can go up to the limits of conscious- 
ness. If, therefore, we are indefinitely conscious of the 
ultimate cause, we can indefinitely think or conceive it ; 



400 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

and we are surprised by the contradiction: we cannot 
and we can conceive the ultimate cause. Again, if it he 
true that conception cannot transcend consciousness, it 
is equally true that consciousness cannot transcend con- 
ception; and we meet the further contradiction: we 
cannot conceive the first cause, but we are conscious of 
it. If he says that we apprehend the ultimate cause by 
a belief consisting of a datum of consciousness, he con- 
founds belief with consciousness — he identifies them; 
for that which consists of a thing is of the same nature 
with it; but who ever heard that belief and conscious- 
ness are one and the same ? If he says that we appre- 
hend the ultimate cause simply by belief, he gives up his 
whole agnostic philosophy, and incontinently surrenders 
to the theist. Taking Mr. Spencer, then, on either of 
the various roads — and they are divergent — by which 
he seeks to reach the first or ultimate cause, he is led to 
either self-contradiction or self-inconsistency. 

Mr. Spencer elaborately endeavors to prove what few 
would deny — that there can be no conception of self- 
existence, or self-creation, or creation by external 
agency. Granted. Hamilton and others had abundantly 
proved that before him. Common sense had always 
proved it. The fallacy consists in supposing that there 
is any respectably supported hypothesis favoring the 
conception of the origin of the universe. The question 
is in regard to a belief in its origin. 'No sensible man 
believes in the self-existence of the finite. Almost all 
men believe in the self-existence of the infinite. Mr. 
Spencer himself believes in it. Else why his affirmation 
of an infinite and eternal energy ? But if he believes in 



Spencek's Agnostic Philosophy. 401 

it, the whole question of the conception of it is 
dismissed. 

Mr. Spencer, moreover, argues in favor of the extra- 
ordinary supposition that the ultimate cause transcends 
intelligence and will. This hypothesis is advocated for 
the purpose of vindicating his somewhat heated declara- 
tion that he neither affirmed nor denied personality. 1 
Touching this palpably atheistic position, he remarks: 

" This, which to most will seem an essentially irreligious posi- 
tion, is an essentially religious one — nay, is the religious one, to 
which, as already shown, all others are but approximations. In 
the estimate it implies of the Ultimate Cause, it does not fall 
short of the alternative position, but exceeds it. Those who 
espouse this alternative position make the erroneous supposition 
that the choice is between personality and something lower than 
personality; whereas the choice is between personality and some- 
thing higher. Is it not just possible that there is a mode of being 
as much transcending Intelligence and Will as those transcend 
mechanical motion? It is true that we are totally unable to 
conceive any such higher mode of being. But this is not a reason 
for questioning its existence ; it is rather the reverse." 2 

This is a desperate attempt, made with clenched teeth, 
to get quit of a personal God. How little force there is 
in it will be made to appear by one or two obvious con- 
siderations. 

First. Mr. Spencer admits human personality. The 
following passage is in proof : 

"As a preparation for dealing hereafter with the principles of 
sociology, I have, for some years past, directed much attention to 
the modes of thought current in the simpler human societies ; and 
evidence of many kinds, furnished by all varieties of uncivilized 
men, has forced on me a conclusion harmonizing with that lately 
expressed in this Review by Prof. Huxley — namely, that the sav- 

1 First Prin., p. 108. 2 Ibid., p. 109. 



402 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

age, conceiving a corpse to be deserted by the active personality 
who dwelt in it, conceives this active personality to be still 
existing," etc. 1 

Mr. Spencer, then, must concede the legitimacy of 
arguing from our own personal will. Now he may be 
safely challenged to show how we get our belief in cause, 
except as it is conditioned by the conscious volitions of 
our own wills by which certain phenomenal changes are 
effected. Think away this genesis of the causal judg- 
ment, and naught would remain but the observation of 
the relation of antecedence and sequence; and to call 
that relation one of cause and effect would be to abuse 
the language and insult the intelligence of mankind. 
The law of causality is a fundamental element of our 
intellectual constitution, but it is the efficiency of our 
wills, when exerted, that affords the concrete experience 
which brings out the law into formal expression in 
actual judgments affirming the relation of cause and 
effect. Take away the exercises of the will, and the law 
of causality would be entirely dormant. Take away the 
intelligence, and there would be no law of causality. 
The existence of the law supposes the intelligence, and 
the consciousness of its empirical development supposes 
the will. 

How, then, it may be demanded, does Mr. Spencer 
get his affirmation of an ultimate cause ? He employs 
his own intelligence and will, which alone give him the 
apprehension of cause, to show that the ultimate cause 
transcends intelligence and will. Granted that he may 
get force, the question is pressed, How does he get 
1 Recent Disc., pp. 34, 35. 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 403 

cause ? If his ultimate force is not possessed of intelli- 
gence, it is unconscious. If it is devoid of will, it is 
impersonal. It is a blind, unconscious, impersonal 
force. He has no ground upon which to affirm of it that 
it is a cause. Were he to say that he neither affirms nor 
denies of it causality, just as he says that he neither 
affirms nor denies of it personality, the case would be 
somewhat different; but he affirms that the ultimate 
force is the ultimate cause. Such an affirmation is 
arbitrary and groundless. He is reduced to the alterna- 
tive of holding that, although called cause, it is in the 
category of antecedence and sequence ; and then he must 
maintain that it is either an infinite and eternal antece- 
dent, or an infinite and eternal series of antecedents and 
sequents. An infinite antecedent it cannot be, for an 
antecedent is limited and conditioned by its sequent; 
and no mere antecedent could be infinite, which implies 
the absence of limitation and conditions. Neither could 
it be an eternal antecedent, for an antecedent, from its 
very nature, supposes temporal succession, and is condi- 
tioned by time in its relation to its sequent. Nor yet 
could it be held to be an infinite and eternal series of 
antecedents and sequents ; for a series consists of parts. 
Each of these parts limits and conditions some other 
part, and is consequently finite ; but what is predicable 
of all the parts is predicable of the whole. Therefore, 
the whole must be finite. The supposition of infinity is 
destroyed. Further, as each of the parts is finite, it 
began. The whole, therefore, began, and the supposi- 
tion of eternity is impossible. 

Further, an infinite cause must be one to which all 



404: Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

the perfections that it is possible to predicate of cause 
actually belong; for if it is deficient in any of these 
perfections, it is not infinite. The infinite is the perfect. 
But Mr. Spencer does not assign to his ultimate cause 
intelligence, will, personality, and — it may be added — 
moral character, perfections which are attributable to 
a cause. Consequently his ultimate cause cannot be 
infinite. Yet he affirms it to be infinite and eternal. 

Secondly. The attempt to get quit of intelligence 
and personal will in the ultimate cause is vain, because 
such a cause could not originate the universe, so far as 
it involves intelligence and personal will in its constitu- 
ent parts. Mr. Spencer admits the existence of the 
intelligence and personal will of men. The question is, 
How did they originate? His answer must be, In the 
causal agency of the ultimate force ; but is this causal 
agency creative? He answers, No. How, then, do 
human intelligence and will originate? He replies, In 
the ultimate force evolving itself by the law of immanent 
necessity. The further question then presses, How can 
an unintelligent, impersonal force be a cause of intelli- 
gence and personal will by evolution ? 

The theist concedes that as God is a free cause he may 
produce existence, which is essentially different in na- 
ture from his own. He is, he holds, a pure spirit, but 
being a free cause, he may create matter ; but did the 
theist hold that God evolves matter, he would contradict 
himself. In the same way, Mr. Spencer contradicts 
himself when he contends that an unintelligent, imper- 
sonal cause, which is, therefore, not free, but necessary, 
evolves from itself intelligence and personality. An 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 405 

ultimate free cause may, by its free acts, produce exist- 
ences which are essentially different from each other, 
even contradictory to each other — spirit and matter, 
for example ; but an ultimate necessary cause could not 
do the same, for it operates, by the law of its being, in 
one necessary mode, which excludes variation. Two 
necessary modes of operation, resulting in contradictory 
effects, would imply self-contradiction in the operating 
cause ; and if it be said that the contradictory modes of 
operation are grounded in contradictory necessary laws 
or principles in the original cause itself, the case is 
reduced to egregious absurdity — an ultimate self- 
contradictory cause ! Two insuperable difficulties oppose 
Mr. Spencer's hypothesis of an unintelligent and imper- 
sonal ultimate cause : one, that it produces, by evolution 
from itself, intelligent and personal existences which are 
essentially different from itself; the other, that it 
evolves unintelligent and impersonal existences and 
also intelligent and personal existences which are essen- 
tially different from each other. The truth is that Mr. 
Spencer perpetrates a solecism when he denominates his 
ultimate force a cause. It does not produce, it evolves. 
It is not efficient, it is only effluent. So much for an 
ultimate cause which probably transcends intelligence 
and personality ; for an hypothesis that would make an 
unintelligent and impersonal thing infinitely superior 
to an intelligent and personal being. 

(3.) Mr. Spencer is self -contradictory with reference 
to the relation of his ultimate force to the evolution of 
the universe. 

Let us get a general view of his theory in regard to 



406 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

this matter. The universe is subject to two great pro- 
cesses, which are complementary to each other, namely, 
evolution and dissolution. Evolution consists in the 
integration of matter ; dissolution in the dissipation of 
motion. What is evolved always tends to be dissolved. 
The final result of the operation of these two "antago- 
nistic" forces is the dissolution of the universal system 
into a nebular mass ; but force is persistent, and motion 
indestructible. This "necessitates a reverse distribu- 
tion" of matter. The nebular stuff begins again to 
rotate, and the competing forces of evolution and disso- 
lution are started upon a fresh race, to end in a like 
result. This goes on forever. He himself furnishes a 
marvellous picture of this interminable circumgyration 
of universes : 

" Motion, as well as Matter, being fixed in quantity, it would 
seem that the change in the distribution of Matter which Motion 
effects, coming to a limit in whichever direction it is carried, the 
indestructible Motion thereupon necessitates a reverse distribu- 
tion. Apparently, the universally co-existent forces of attraction 
and repulsion, which, as we have seen, necessitate rhythm in all 
minor changes throughout the universe, also necessitate rhythm in 
the totality of its changes — produce now an immeasurable period 
during which the attractive forces predominating, cause universal 
concentration,. and then an immeasurable period during which the 
repulsive forces predominating, cause universal diffusion — alter- 
nate eras of Evolution and Dissolution. And thus there is sug- 
gested the conception [ ! ] of a past during which there have been 
successive Evolutions analogous to that which is now going on; 
and a future during which successive other such Evolutions 
ma y [ • ] g° on — ever the same in principle, but never the same 
in concrete results." * 

These counter-working forces of evolution and disso- 

1 First Prin., pp. 536, 537. 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 407 

lution Mr. Spencer brings into unity in persistent force. 
The whole integrating process of evolution is to be 
ultimately referred to persistent force. So, also, the 
whole disintegrating process of dissolution is to be 
ultimately assigned to persistent force. Both processes 
are unified upon the same principle : 

"We even saw grounds for the belief that the far vaster masses 
dispersed at almost immeasurable intervals through space, will, 
at a time beyond the reach of finite imaginations, share the same 
fate; and that so universal Evolution will be followed by uni- 
versal Dissolution — a conclusion which, like those preceding it, we 
saw to be deducible from the Persistence of Force. 

" It may be added that in so unifying the phenomena of Dis- 
solution with those of Evolution, as being manifestations of the 
same ultimate law under opposite conditions, we also unify the 
phenomena presented by the existing universe with the like phe- 
nomena that have preceded them and will succeed them — so far, 
at least, as such unification is possible to our limited intelli- 
gences." * 

" The recognition of a persistent Force, ever changing its mani- 
festations, but unchanged in quantity throughout all past time 
and all future time, is that which we find alone makes possible 
each concrete interpretation, and at last unifies all concrete inter- 
pretations." 2 

Let it be observed that this unifying persistent force 
is the same with Mr. Spencer's fundamental reality, 
which he variously designates as the ultimate force, the 
ultimate cause, the infinite and eternal energy, the ulti- 
mate of ultimates, and the way is open for the criticisms 
which will be made. 

First. It would seem manifest that it is incorrect to 
term Mr. Spencer the philosopher of evolution. He is 
the professed philosopher of evolution and dissolution. 

1 First Prin., p. 550. 2 Ibid., p. 552. 



408 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

He is not only an evolutionist, but a dissolutionist. His 
is not merely an evolving, but a dissolving philosophy 
(and since he wills it so to be, so mote it be !). An out- 
sider has no right to quarrel with the names selected by a 
family, but it is respectfully suggested that the analysis 
already in these remarks submitted is correct in repre- 
senting Mr. Spencer's philosophy as the New Philosophy 
of Force. His ultimate reality, upon which he reduces 
everything to unity, is an energy which, from itself, 
evolves the systems of the universe and evermore dis- 
solves them; and then evermore evolves again the 
systems which it has dissolved. 

Secondly. He makes the infinite finite, and the finite 
infinite. He holds that his ultimate force is infinite. 
He also contends that matter and motion — and he in- 
cludes mind in motion — as relative forces are, as we 
have seen, modes of manifestation of the infinite force, 
ISFow matter and motion are finite. They are, as Mr. 
Spencer would allow, limited and conditioned. The 
modes of a thing are the thing itself modified. The 
conclusion is obvious that Mr. Spencer represents the 
infinite force as evolving itself into the finite; which is 
a stupendous contradiction. The pantheist objects to 
the theistic doctrine, that it makes the creative will of 
an infinite being in its acts terminate upon the finite; 
but such a difficulty is nothing compared with that 
inhering in the pantheistic doctrine that the infinite 
becomes the finite. The difference between the panthe- 
ist and Mr. Spencer — that the former makes an infinite 
substance, the latter an infinite force, become by evolu- 
tion finite — does not affect the application of this reduc- 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 409 

tio ad absurdum to the agnostic philosopher. It will 
not answer to say that the infinite force and its modes 
are not one and the same, and hence not susceptible of 
common predication. Abstract matter and mental sub- 
stance from the infinite force, and what becomes of the 
infinite force itself? What is it that is immanent in 
matter and spirit considered as different from the ulti- 
mate force ? Further, if the modes matter and motion 
are different from the ultimate force, another contra- 
diction is admitted — namely, that the evolver is evolved 
into something different from itself. 

The contradiction that the infinite becomes finite 
involves the other contradiction, which has been men- 
tioned, that the finite is infinite. Mr. Spencer concedes 
the finiteness of matter and motion; but he says that 
they are the infinite force as modified. It follows that 
the finite relative forces, being said to be the absolute 
force as modified, are what the infinite force is : infinite. 
The case being viewed from both sides, the side of the 
infinite evolved into the finite, and the side of the finite 
identified with the infinite, Mr. Spencer is reduced to 
the contradiction of asserting an infinite-finite force. 

Thirdly. Mr. Spencer makes the infinite pass 
through innumerable changes. It passes through all 
the changes to which the inorganic and the organic 
worlds are subject. It is evolved, it is nebular, it is 
rotated, it is crystallized, it is organized, it is differen- 
tiated, it is equilibrated, it is dissipated, it is dissolved. 
It is not that the infinite force decrees and effects these 
changes, it is the infinite force itself which is thus 
changed. Else what means evolution ? It needs scarcely 



410 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

to be observed that the theistic doctrine is not liable to 
this objection. That an infinite being should freely 
cause changes is credible; but that an infinite force, 
acting by necessity, should evolve into changing modes 
different from each other, as, for example, inorganic 
and organic, dead and living — this involves self- 
contradiction, and, therefore, passes the limits of belief. 
A revolving, evolving, dissolving infinite is something 
that imposes too severe a tax upon even a boundless 
credulity. 

Fourthly. Mr. Spencer makes the unconditioned 
cause conditioned. That he represents the ultimate 
cause as unconditioned will be conceded by every reader 
of his works. For instance, he says, "Force, as we 
know it, can be regarded only as a certain conditioned 
effect of the unconditioned cause." * But it is held that 
relative force is the conditioning manifestation of the 
absolute force, which is the same with the unconditioned 
cause. This unconditioned cause does not manifest 
itself by created effects — the hypothesis of creation is 
rejected — but through modes which are evolved from 
itself and condition itself. The universe is the condi- 
tioned manifestation of the infinite evolving force — 
that is, in other words, it is the infinite force as condi- 
tioned in order to be manifested. There is no other way 
in which the conditioned manifestation of an infinite 
evolving force can be apprehended. The unconditioned 
cause is ever conditioning itself in the evolution of the 
universe. The universe is itself as conditioned. 

Either the universe is spontaneously generated; or 

1 First Prin.y p. 170. 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 411 

it is created ; or it is evolved. To say the first would be 
to break with science ; to affirm the second would be to 
agree with theism ; ]\Ir. Spencer holds neither — he con- 
tends that it is evolved. "Well, then, the universe is the 
evolving force as evolved; but the universe is condi- 
tioned. The contradiction cannot be escaped of a con- 
ditioned unconditioned cause as the evolver of the 
universe. 

That Mr. Spencer has not been here misrepresented 
will appear from the following utterance : 

" I recognize no forces within the organism, or without the 
organism, but the variously-conditioned modes of the universal 
immanent force; and the whole process of organic evolution is 
everywhere attributed by me to the co-operation of its variously- 
conditioned modes, internal and external. That this has been all 
along my general view, is clearly shown in the closing paragraph 
of First Principles." x 

Fifthly. Mr. Spencer gives us a logical distribution 
of the ultimate infinite force, which is as curious as it 
is self-contradictory. This force is divided by him into 
self-evolved generic modes by which it is "conditioned" 
— space-occupying force which is not a working force; 
and working force, which again is distributed into act- 
ual and potential force. "The first of these — the space- 
occupying kind of force — has," he tells us, "no specific 
name." Touching the other specific kind of force, he 
remarks : 

" For the second kind of force, distinguishable as that by which 
change is either being caused or will be caused if counterbalancing 
forces are overcome, the specific name now accepted is 'Energy.' 
So we have 'actual energy/ and 'potential energy.' " 

1 Letter appended to Vol. I. of First Principles of Biology, 
p. 491. 



412 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

In the first place, here is an infinite force divided 
into two different kinds of force. The infinite is di- 
vided, which is a contradiction; and it is divided into 
different and mutually exclusive species, which is, if 
possible, a worse contradiction. 

In the second place, we have an infinite force sup- 
posed to be checked by counterbalancing forces, and 
checked when it is actually energizing, which is a contra- 
diction. 

In the third place, we have an infinite force checked 
by, and unable to overcome, counterbalancing forces, 
which are evolved from itself — that is, checked and 
foiled by itself, which is a contradiction. 

In the fourth place, as Mr. Spencer has among his 
more recent utterances formally denominated the ulti- 
mate force "an infinite and eternal energy," we have 
the genus infinite force distributed into the species non- 
working force and working force (or energy). Of 
course, energy as working is specifically differentiated 
from force as not working ; and then we have one of the 
species (energy) made the genus (infinite and eternal 
energy), which amounts to the distribution of the genus 
energy into the two species, non-energy and energy. 
This is so strange that we attribute it not to Mr. Spencer 
— he is too good a logician — but to his "unspeakable" 
hypothesis, which led him to attempt logical work upon 
an unknowable subject. Perhaps it is as good a logical 
distribution as could have been effected of an inconceiv- 
able thing. It is possible that Mr. Spencer would say 
that when he called the infinite force an energy he meant 
potential energy ; but, then, potential energy as generic 



Spenceb's Agnostic Philosophy. 413 

would include under it the species actual energy; and 
since the essence of the genus descends into the species, 
we would have the genus potential energy including 
under it the species potential-actual energy. It is a pity 
that Mr. Spencer did not adhere to the term force for 
his ultimate reality. His energy has proved a snare to 
him. 

Sixthly. Mr. Spencer's doctrine as to the connection 
of the ultimate force with the evolution of religion 
and morality is beset with self-contradiction and 
absurdity. 

In the first place, he represents his ultimate reality as 
proceeding without the least compliance with truth, by 
evolving all the antagonistic religious beliefs which have 
existed in the world. Religion as a fact could not be 
denied, and it had to be accounted for. Accordingly, it 
was assigned, along with everything else, to "that great 
evolution" which is the cause of the universe, with all its 
contents. In Mr. Spencer's opinion, religion has been 
gradually evolved. Beginning with fetichism, it has, 
under the sure guidance of evolution, passed through 
the stages of polytheism and monotheism up to agnosti- 
cism or atheism. As each of these beliefs is to be 
attributed to the ultimate reality evolving itself, each is 
to be treated with respect, not only on account of a com- 
mon parentage with the others, but also because of "a 
real adaptation" to "the natures of those who defend 
it." 1 These beliefs, although absolutely contradictory 
to each other, were or are right, considering the circum- 
stances in which they were or are entertained. Fetich- 
1 First Prin., pp. 119, 122. 



414: Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ism was right, in its circumstances ; so was polytheism ; 
and so, notwithstanding the kicks he administers to it, 
the great agnostic with a sardonic smile and a conde- 
scending air concedes the worship of the one, living, per- 
sonal Grod to be. Not only were these contradictory be- 
liefs necessary products of evolution, and, therefore, not 
to be condemned, while they successively existed in the 
past, but the same is true of them, so far as they are 
contemporary beliefs. "We must recognize them as 
elements in that great evolution of which the beginning 
and the end are beyond our knowledge or conception — 
as modes of manifestation of the unknowable; and as 
having this for their warrant." So, then, the fetichism 
of the African bone-worshipper, the polytheism of the 
Asiatic pagan, the uni-personal monetheism of the Mo- 
hammedan, the trinitarian theism of the Christian, and 
the agnostic atheism of Mr. Spencer are all synchronous 
manifestations of the ultimate reality, and have their 
warrant in that fact. 

Every religious thinker, therefore, who, like Mr. 
Spencer, is in advance of his time, should consider that 
he is a higher product of the evolutionary force which 
has gradually worked upwards through lower forms of 
belief. He should justify his propagation of his views 
by this reflection : 

" He, like every other man, may properly consider himself as 
one of the myriad agencies through whom works the Unknown 
Cause; and when the Unknown Cause produces in him a certain 
belief, he is thereby authorized to profess and act out that belief." * 

Hence the sympathy which Mr. Spencer inculcates 
1 First Prin., p. 123. 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 415 

for beliefs antagonistic to one's own — a sympathy which 

he professes to feel for theism and Christianity at the 

same time that he visits them with his scorn, and is 

doing his best to exterminate them : 

" Our toleration therefore should be the widest possible. Or 
rather, we should aim at something beyond toleration, as com- 
monly understood. In dealing with alien beliefs our endeavor 
must be, not simply to refrain from injustice of word or deed, but 
also to do justice by an open recognition of positive worth [!]. 
We must qualify our disagreement with as much as may be of 
sympathy." x 

That is, as he, Mr. Spencer, has killed our God, he 
will be gracious enough to shed a tear with us at the 
funeral ! 

The cool indifference to truth exhibited in these senti- 
ments must strike the most cursory reader. Perhaps 
he will say that Mr. Spencer is to be excused, since the 
ultimate force which evolved him is the acknowledged 
author of untruth. 

In the second place, all the conflicting theories of 
morality which have ever existed, or still exist, are alike 
the products of the same evolutionary force. There is 
no need to enlarge upon this point. What was urged in 
relation to religion is applicable, mutatis mutandis, to 
morality. In itself non-moral, this force evolves itself 
into morality and immorality. As evolved, it is both 
saint and criminal. 

In the third place, it follows, from these views, that 
the ultimate force is, through the necessary process of 
evolution, the producer of sanctity and impiety, of 

1 First Prin., p. 122. 



416 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

virtue and crime. Wonderful force ! Characterized by 
unity, it causes, by the necessary law of evolution, 
opposites the most contradictory to each other. The 
principle of organized life, it is the principle of death ; 
it brings forth life and death from the same evolving 
womb. Itself is life, itself is death. The bigoted relig- 
ionist who butchers his fellowman for dissenting from 
him is but the evolutionary force in one of its products 
butchering itself in another of its products. The assas- 
sin who murders his neighbor is but the same evolu- 
tionary force in one of its products murdering itself in 
another of its products. Not only does it discharge the 
transcendent office of ever evolving and dissolving the 
vast universe through "immeasurable periods," but it 
daily evolves and dissolves the finite parts of its infinite 
self in innumerable instances. Concentrating in its 
unity the several functions of the Parcse, it spins from 
itself the thread of every separate life, allots its measure- 
ment, and with fatal scissors cuts it off. Mortal- 
immortal force! Ever dying in all its parts, and ever 
living as a whole ! 

In the fourth place, Mr. Spencer's theory, logically 
construed, makes the ultimate force worship itself. As 
an infinite and eternal energy, it is held by him to be the 
object of worship. As every worshipper is evolved from 
this ultimate force, it certainly comes to this that it 
worships itself. Mr. Spencer girds savagely at the 
Christian doctrine in this contemptuous manner. 
Speaking of the difficulty which the agnostic, as the per- 
fection of evolution, experiences in dealing patiently 
with that doctrine, he says : 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 417 

" He may think it needless as it is difficult, to conceal his 
repugnance to a creed which tacitly ascribes to the Unknowable a 
love of adulation such as would be despised in a human being." x 

Whether Mr. Spencer's object of worship is liable to 
the same contemptuous fling or not, it is certain that 
the Christian is not silly enough to offer adulation to 
an abstract Something which could not appreciate it, or 
to represent his God as offering worship to himself. 

Seventhly. Mr. Spencer's evolution has no telic 
significance; it obliterates teleology. He admits the 
infinity of his ultimate force, but denies to it personal 
will. Consequently the evolution of the universe from 
that force is purposeless ; but the marks of general order 
and of special adaptations are everywhere so conspicuous 
as to have been generally acknowledged by philosophers 
as well as by the mass of mankind. The inference is 
irresistible to an intelligent Designer. This inference 
Mr. Spencer's theory repudiates. The evolved persons 
are designers, but the evolver of the persons is not a 
designer. The contradiction is obvious. The objection 
of Kant and others to this argument that it fails to prove 
infinity — whether tenable or not — has no bearing upon 
the present question, for the reason that Mr. Spencer 
admits the infinity of the evolutionary force. What is 
pertinent in the argument is that the evidences of design 
prove a designer. Mr. Spencer can only evade the force 
of the argument by denying the marks of purpose in 
the universe, and in doing this he breaks with philosophy 
and the common sense of the race. The odds are 
supremely against him. 

1 First Prin., p. 120. 



418 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

But this recitation of self-contradictions grows monot- 
onous. Let us gather up some of them, at least, in one 
concluding statement : 

This ultimate force as infinite is unknowable; as 
evolved it is knowable: it is the unknowable-knowable. 
As infinite it is immutable; as evolved it is mutable: it 
is the immutable-mutable. As infinite it is without 
parts; as evolved it has parts: it is the indivisible- 
divisible. As infinite it is perfect; as evolved it de- 
velops, and is therefore imperfect: it is the perfect- 
imperfect. As infinite it is uncaused; as evolved it is 
caused; it is the uncaused-caused. As infinite it is 
cause ; as evolved it is effect : it is cause and effect. As 
infinite it is indissoluble; as evolved it is dissoluble: 
it is the indissoluble-dissoluble. As infinite it is eternal ; 
as evolved it is temporal : it is the eternal-temporal. As 
infinite it is unconditioned ; as evolved it is conditioned : 
it is the unconditioned-conditioned. As infinite it is 
absolute; as evolved it is relative: it is the absolute- 
relative. As infinite it is unorganized; as evolved it 
is in the animal and vegetable kingdoms organized : it is 
the unorganized-organized. As infinite it is unintelli- 
gent ; as evolved it is intelligent : it is the unintelligent- 
intelligent. As infinite it is impersonal; as evolved it 
is personal: it is the impersonal-personal. As infinite 
is is worshipped ; as evolved it is the worshipper : it is 
the worshipped-worshipper. As infinite it is non-moral ; 
as evolved it is both moral and immoral : it is the non- 
moral-moral-immoral. In a word, it is the Infinite- 
Finite. 

It could only be paralleled, and that in a finite degree, 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 419 

by a material thing which might be characterized as 
unextended-extended, indivisible-divisible, non-resistant- 
resistant, impenetrable-penetrable, spherical-flat, circu- 
lar-square, high-low, long-short, thick-thin, wide-narrow, 
black- white, solid-liquid, and deep-shallow; especially 
deep-shallow. 

It may be said that this is sheer extravagance. That 
it is not, but, on the contrary, is sober fact, is shown by 
a single disjunctive argument. In regard to the exist- 
ence of the finite universe there are but four conceivable 
hypotheses : Either its self -existence, or its creation, or 
its spontaneous generation, or its evolution. The first 
two Mr. Spencer everywhere rejects ; the third he also 
rejects; 1 the fourth — that of evolution — is, therefore, 
exclusive of the others. It follows indisputably that 
the finite universe which is evolved from or out of the 
infinite, ultimate force is that force as evolved. To say 
that Mr. Spencer only asserts that the parts, the con- 
tents, of the universe are modes of the infinite force is 
nothing worth. A thing and its modes are essentially 
identical. The explanation only serves to illuminate 
the contradictoriness of his theory ; for who ever heard 
of finite modes of the infinite ? 

7. Some things remain to be said briefly respecting 
Mr. Spencer's positions as to evolution itself. 

(1.) Mr. Spencer's system does not deal with "inor- 
ganic evolution." It is by no means intimated that the 
omission is intentional. Mr. Spencer tells us that it is 
not. 2 But the omission is a fact. The system, there- 
fore, is incomplete. Evolution is attempted to be 
1 Prin. Biology, Vol. I., p. 480. 2 Prin. Biology, Vol. I., p. 479. 



420 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

explained only in part. Should Mr. Spencer hereafter 
remedy the defect, he will have two questions to answer : 
how inorganic matter came to be evolved from his pri- 
mordial force, and how, in the process of evolution, the 
transition was effected from the inorganic to the organic. 
In regard to the first question, it will behoove him to 
show how, if his ultimate force is living, the non-living 
can be evolved from the living ; or, how, if the ultimate 
force is non-living, it is active enough to evolve anything, 
and how, on that supposition, the living can be evolved 
from the non-living. In answering the other question, 
how the inorganic is evolved into the organic, it is to be 
hoped — indeed, it may be expected, from our knowledge 
of his scientific qualities, his patience in analysis and 
his honesty in generalization — that he will not resort to 
the remarkable hypothesis of some, that the evolutionary 
force is subject to spasms, and that in one of its paroxys- 
mal efforts it leaped over the "great and wide" chasm 
between the inorganic and the organic — between death 
and life. One is almost inevitably reminded of the 
extraordinary exploit celebrated in the line of a vener- 
able household classic, "And the cow jumped over the 
moon." Until these questions are answered by Mr. 
Spencer, the "law of evolution" comes short, so far as 
he is concerned, of being a generalization founded upon 
a sufficient induction; it is halted at a critical point. 
We may expect from him scientific proofs, not the mere 
vagaries of the imagination. 

(2.) ~Not only does Mr. Spencer not indicate the con- 
nection between inorganic and organic evolution, which 
must be done before any systematic account of the evo- 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 421 

lutionary process can be complete, but his brilliant 
attempt to expound organic evolution is destitute of a 
competent basis. He begins with the mere assumption 
that life, in the first instance, is evolved. No proofs of 
this postulate are furnished. Indeed, Mr. Spencer 
blunders in his effort to define life. He himself con- 
fesses that the definition is only an approximate one. 
An examination of this approximate definition at once 
shows that he endeavors to define, not life itself, but its 
functions, relations and results. The fundamental ele- 
ment — if such an expression can be applied to a simple 
and indivisible principle — which he gives is "the co- 
ordination of actions" : 

" I have myself proposed to define Life as 'the co-ordination of 
actions;' and I still incline towards this definition as one answer- 
ing to the facts with tolerable precision." x 

But it is clear that both the conception's "actions" and 
the "coordination of actions" presuppose the conception 
of life itself as a principle of action, and of coordination 
of actions. We have here no account of life itself, and 
consequently no account of the process by which it has 
been evolved. Until the question is answered, What is 
evolved ? one fails to see how the other question can be 
answered, How is it evolved? But Mr. Spencer knows 
how to evolve the unknowable. Perhaps he would say 
that we are indefinitely conscious of what life is, and 
that is sufficient to ground a scientific account of its 
evolution. Science, however, is knowledge ; and Mr. 
Spencer distinguishes indefinite consciousness from 
knowledge. Not only, then, is there no account of inor- 

1 Prin. Biology, Vol. L, p. 60. 



422 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ganic evolution and of its relation to organic evolution, 
but Mr. Spencer's endeavor to explain organic evolution 
is u the baseless fabric of a vision." His biology aston- 
ishes us in two respects: by the mastery of scientific 
knowledge which it evinces, and by the fact that it rests 
on no foundation. It may be that this is an instance of 
the law mentioned by Mr. Spencer that scientific evolu- 
tion must "begin somewhere abruptly." 1 

This is the more remarkable because Mr. Spencer 
pronounces biology of supreme importance in relation 
to the question of the origin of species. Comparing his 
views with those of M. Compte, he says : 

" How organic beings have originated, is an inquiry which 
M. Compte deprecates as a useless speculation: asserting, as he 
does, that species are immutable. 

" This inquiry, I believe, admits of answer, and will be an- 
swered. That division of Biology which concerns itself with the 
origin of species I hold to be the supreme division, to which all 
others are subsidiary. For on the verdict of Biology on this 
matter must wholly depend our conception of human nature, past, 
present, and future ; our theory of the mind ; and our theory of 
society." * 

(3.) It deserves notice that Mr. Spencer makes 
geology unavailable to both the opponents and the advo- 
cates of evolution. It is excluded from the field of 
evidence bearing on the question. Speaking of Hugh 
Miller's arguments against the development hypothesis, 
arguments which he derived from geology, he remarks : 

" While we purpose showing that his arguments against the 
Development Hypothesis are based on invalid assumptions, we 
do not purpose showing that the opposing arguments are based 
on valid assumptions. We hope to make it apparent that the 

1 Recent Discussions, p. 187. 2 Ibid., p. 128. 



Spen-cek's Agnostic Philosophy. 423 

geological evidence at present obtained is insufficient for either 
side; further, that there seems little probability of sufficient 
evidence ever being obtained; and that if the question is eventu- 
ally decided, it must be decided on other than geological data." 1 

This opinion of the great evolutionist merits the 
attention of those who as confidently expound the secrets 
of geology as though they had been contemporaries of 
the Ascidia ; and to whom the language might be em- 
phatically used which was addressed by Daniel Webster 
to the veteran survivors of the American revolutionary 
war, "Venerable men ! you have come down to us from 
a former generation." 

(4.) Mr. Spencer furnishes us a disproof of organic 
evolution in his attempt to account for the origin of 
animal-worship. His own language will be employed 
in the development of the steps of the argument: 

" The rudimentary form of all religion is the propitiation of 
dead ancestors, who are supposed to be still existing, and to be 

capable of working good or evil to their descendants 

Savages habitually distinguish individuals by names that are 
either directly suggestive of some personal trait or fact of per- 
sonal history, or else express an observed community of character 
with some well-known object. . . . Now, in the earliest savage 
state this metaphorical naming will, in most cases, commence 
afresh in each generation — must do so, indeed, until surnames of 
some kind have been established. I say in most cases, because 
there will occur exceptions in the cases of men who have distin- 
guished themselves. If 'the Wolf,' proving famous in fight, be- 
comes a terror to neighboring tribes, and a dominant man in his 
own, his sons, proud of their parentage, will not let fall the fact 
that they descended from the Wolf ; nor will this fact be forgotten 
by the rest of the tribe, who hold 'the Wolf in awe, and see some 
reason to dread his sons." 

" Let the tradition of the ancestor fail to keep clearly in view 

1 Illustrations of Univer. Progress, p. 354. 



424 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

the fact that he was a man called the Wolf — let him be habitually 
spoken of as the Wolf, just as when alive; and the natural mis- 
take of taking the name literally will bring with it, firstly, a 
belief in descent from the actual wolf, and, secondly, a treatment 
of the wolf in a manner likely to propitiate him — a manner 
appropriate to one who may be the other self of the dead ancestor, 
or one of the kindred, and therefore a friend." 

" Descent from the Wolf will inevitably come to mean descent 
from the animal known by that name. And the ideas and senti- 
ments which, as above shown, naturally grow up around the belief 
that the dead parents and grandparents are still alive, and ready, 
if propitiated, to befriend their descendants, will be extended to 
the wolf species." x 

Now it is evident that this ingenious account of the 
origin of worship which may he paid to the wolf, or to 
any other animals, admits that the worshippers are 
mistaken in supposing that they are actually descended 
from the animals worshipped. Mr. Spencer talks like 
any other civilized man of common sense about the 
illusory belief of savages respecting human descent from 
an animal ancestry. What becomes, then, of his organic 
evolution ? If the analysis had been written in order to 
disprove the hypothesis of the evolution of species from 
species it could hardly be more complete and convincing. 
Mr. Spencer ought to be able to convince himself. Is 
that which is foolish in poor savages wise in persons of 
scientific culture? If, as Mr. Spencer professes, he is 
descended from animal ancestors, it is certain that none 
of them could have been caught in so powerful a trap 
as that which he has here constructed for himself, and 
which holds him with a grip of steel, else had Mr. 
Spencer not have descended. The Australian and the 

1 Recent Discussions, pp. 34-42. 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 425 

Tasmanian display their ignorance in believing that they 

descended from animals, but the supremely cultivated 

scholars and gentlemen of Britain exhibit their superior 

knowledge in believing the same thing ! Verily, these 

coryphaei of science must be perpetrating a hoax upon 

their contemporaries. 

(5.) In a comparison of the theory of creation and 

that of evolution, Mr. Spencer contradicts himself, and 

virtually concedes the immense superiority of the former 

theory to the latter. After expounding the nebular 

hypothesis, and remarking "that, while the genesis of 

the solar system, and of countless other systems like it, 

is thus rendered comprehensible, the ultimate mystery 

continues as great as ever," he goes on to observe : 

" The Nebular Hypothesis throws no light on the origin of 
diffused matter; and diffused matter as much needs accounting 
for as concrete matter. The genesis of an atom is not easier to 
conceive than the genesis of a planet. Nay, indeed, so far from 
making the Universe a less mystery than before, it makes it a 
greater mystery. Creation by manufacture is a much lower thing 
than creation by evolution. A man can put together a machine; 
but he cannot make a machine develop itself. . . . That our 
harmonious universe once existed potentially as formless diffused 
matter, and has slowly grown into its present organized state, 
is a far more astonishing fact than would have been its forma- 
tion after the artificial method vulgarly supposed. Those who 
hold it legitimate to argue from phenomena to noumena may 
rightly contend that the Nebular Hypothesis implies a First 
Cause as much transcending 'the mechanical God of Paley,' as 
this does the fetish of the savage." 1 

One cannot help noticing either the partisan blindness 
or the unfairness of this self-contradictory passage. 
First. He makes the genesis of the universe both 

1 Illust. Univ. Progress, pp. 298, 299. 



426 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

comprehensible and absolutely mysterious. He can only 
be saved from this contradiction by the supposition that 
he used genesis as convertible with formation. That 
supposition is opposed, in the first place, by the consid- 
eration that ordinary usage would be violated, and, in 
the second place, that in this very passage he employs 
genesis in the sense of origination, as when he speaks of 
"the genesis of an atom' 7 ; for it would be absurd to 
speak of the formation of an atom, in the sense of con- 
struction, fashioning, arrangement. It must mean 
origination, if it mean anything. An atom is taken to 
mean something simple, uncompounded, indivisible. 
As it confessedly has no parts, it cannot be constructed. 
If brought into existence, it must be by creation — its 
genesis must be creation. Must there be added, then, to 
the swollen list of Mr. Spencer's self-contradictions the 
comprehensible-incomprehensible? 

Secondly. Mr. Spencer declares that the genesis of 
an atom is as inconceivable as the genesis of a planet. 
Here he must mean by genesis creation — origination; 
for he has just before asserted the comprehensibleness 
of the formation — the structural putting together of the 
solar system as a collection of planets from nebular 
matter. We have, then, the point-blank confession by 
him that evolution is utterly incompetent to account for 
the origination of the universe. In this he is certainly 
right; but Mr. Spencer has all along maintained the 
theory that the universe is evolved from the ultimate 
infinite force. This is his philosophy ; and as his evo- 
lution must, like his science of evolution, "begin some- 
where abruptly," we have the assertion that evolution 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 427 

does account for the origination of the universe. Lo, 
another contradiction — an origination of the universe 
which can be accounted for; an origination of the 
universe which cannot he accounted for ! 

Thirdly. Mr. Spencer, after admitting that the origi- 
nation of an atom, and consequently of the universe, by 
evolution is inconceivable, tries hard to get out of the 
difficulty by asserting that the doctrine of creation is in 
a worse difficulty; for "creation by manufacture is a 
much lower thing than creation by evolution." In the 
first place, there is no such thing conceivable as creation 
by evolution, but it is much higher than creation by 
manufacture ! In the second place, creation by manu- 
facture is as much inconceivable as creation by evolution 
— both are inconceivable ; but one conceiving these two 
inconceivable nonentities must conceive that one of them 
is much lower than the other ! In the third place, "crea- 
tion by manufacture" is an absurd piece of balderdash 
that has no other paternity than that of Mr. Spencer 
and his fellow-atheists. Certainly, neither Paley, nor 
any other man of sense, not to say Christian, ever 
dreamed of a manufacture of something out of nothing. 
Manufacture supposes preexisting materials. The sup- 
position that the affirmers of creation out of nothing 
mean manufacture out of something is either the silly or 
the dishonest spawn of the atheistic imagination. 

Creation from nothing is inconceivable, but it is not 
self-contradictory. Evolution from nothing is not only 
inconceivable, but self-contradictory. The evolution of 
something out of nothing is a contradiction in terms. 
As evolution supposes the thing to be evolved, while 



428 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

creation, strictly speaking, supposes nothing upon which 
it is effected, the very contrary of what Mr. Spencer 
asserts is true — namely, that evolution is a much lower 
thing than creation. What Mr. Spencer, with equal 
contemptuousness and unfairness, calls "creation "by 
manufacture" is really the origination of that which is 
supposed to be evolved. The question is, What fur- 
nished the material for the start of the evolving process ? 
That question, which the evolutionist must face, ex- 
plodes Mr. Spencer's attempt to substitute an evolving 
force for a personal creator ; except upon the hypothesis 
that the evolving force is itself the material out of 
which the evolution proceeds — an hypothesis the self- 
contradictoriness and absurdity of which has already in 
this discussion been sufficiently exposed. 

It comes at last to the alternative of an absolute com- 
mencement or of creation. Neither is conceivable, but 
that of an absolute commencement is self-contradictory, 
and in the form of spontaneous generation is abandoned 
by science itself. The other alternative — that of crea- 
tion by an infinite personal creator — must, therefore, be 
accepted as true. 

(6.) The following sharp retort of Mr. Spencer must 
be briefly noticed before these criticisms are brought to 
a close : 

" In a debate upon the development hypothesis, lately narrated 
to me by a friend, one of the disputants was described as arguing 
that as, in all our experience, we know no such phenomenon as 
transmutation of species, it is unphilosophical to assume that 
transmutation of species ever takes place. Had I been present, I 
think that, passing over his assertion, which is open to criticism, 
I should have replied that as, in all our experience, we have never 



Spencer's Agnostic Philosophy. 429 

known a species created, it was, by his own showing, unphilo- 
sophieal to assume that any species ever had been created." x 

First. Let it be supposed that neither the special 
creationist nor the evolutionist had ever witnessed a 
concrete example of his theory, there would result an 
equipoise between the two doctrines in this regard, and 
nothing would be gained on either side. The question 
would not be Avorth discussing ; but — 

Secondly. The special creationist does not maintain 
that we are to expect special creations. On the contrary, 
he holds that special creation occurred in the beginning 
of the present cosmical order, and that there is no need 
that species should again be created, unless that order 
should come to an end, and another should take its place. 
The species oak-tree has been in existence from the time 
that observation began to be recorded, and the special 
creationist looks for no change of that species. If he 
had looked for it, he would certainly have shared the 
disappointment of the evolutionist. 

On the other hand, the evolutionist contends for an 
uninterrupted process of specific transmutations. Ac- 
cording to his hypothesis, we would be led to expect 
some instances of transmutation of species as at least 
likely to occur in the experience of the race in historic 
times. Have all the lines of evolution had precisely the 
same periods to run? Has every particular evolution 
of species had an immeasurable period to run ? Have 
all these periods spanned the age of man on the earth ? 
If so, where is the consistency or the sense of evolution- 
ists trying their very best by selective breeding, in the 
1 Illust. Univ. Progress, p. 377. 



430 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

course of a few years, to disprove the stubborn law of 
hybridism by producing one clear instance of transmu- 
tation of species ? Is there no expectation of seeing one 
such fact ? Ah, that troublesome law of hybridity ! 
Has Professor Huxley ceased to regard it as a menace 
to the Darwinian hypothesis ? x 

Thirdly. The theory of evolution of species into spe- 
cies is confronted with numerous facts incapable of ad- 
justment to it. There are no facts which contradict 
that of special creation. 

But, in the foregoing extract, Mr. Spencer intimates 
that the "assertion" : "we know no such phenomenon 
as transmutation of species" "is open to criticism" — a 
mild, a singularly mild, way of insinuating that we do 
possess such knowledge. Now, what are his proofs ? In 
the first place, that the theory of evolution is much more 
probable than that of special creation ! In the second 
place, that "millions of varieties have been produced," 
and "are being produced still" ! In the third place, that 
evolutions of species intra speciem are continually and 
marvellously occurring, as, for example, the wonderful 
evolution of the oak from the acorn, of the man from 
the infant ! _■ If any one thinks this a caricature, let him 
read the argument in the Illustrations of Universal 
Progress, which follows the passage that has been cited. 

8. Mr. Spencer's philosophy, although ridiculously 
pretending to include an ethical element as a product 
of evolution, makes no provision, and, from the nature 
of the case, can make no provision, for a moral govern- 
ment, proceeding upon the great principle of justice, 

1 Huxley's Origin of Species. 



Spe^cep/s Agnostic Philosophy. 431 

issuing a moral law as its rule, and administering 
rewards to the good, punishments to the had. The con- 
ception of such a government by a non-moral ultimate 
force, evolving itself alike into virtue and vice, duty 
and crime, is a supreme absurdity. An infinite scorpion 
continuing to live, yet eternally darting its venomed 
fangs into its own body, would furnish a poor illustra- 
tion. What there is of character, the most brilliant 
crown of human nature and human achievement, of 
piety and justice, of purity and truth, of charity, philan- 
thropy and pity, of patriotism, honor and duty — of the 
noblest principles and sentiments that inspire the heart 
of man, is bound, in obedience to the necessarily- 
operating law of dissolution, to sink, along with every 
base passion and criminal feature of humanity, into a 
common mass of nebulous matter. Think of it — char- 
acter reduced to nebulous stuff ! What a philosophy ! 

There is a book, venerable with age, replete with 
wisdom, and blazing with genius; containing the first 
cosmogony which ever was written, proclaiming a per- 
sonal God, a perfect moral code, the genesis and develop- 
ment of sin, an atoning Saviour, a renovating Spirit, a 
source of consolation amid life's trials, a peaceful death 
bed, and a heavenly home of transcendent beauty, glory 
and bliss ; a book which has, uninjured, passed through 
an incessant storm of hostile criticism from Celsus to 
the closing decade of the nineteenth century, has through 
all that period received the suffrages not only of saints, 
but philosophers, has always refused to be coordinated 
with the theosophies of the world, and is more and more 
displacing them and pushing them out of existence, 



432 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

disseminating its doctrines in well-nigh all the languages 
of earth, and winning its way to almost universal accept- 
ance — this book, it might have been supposed, would 
simply, as a religious philosophy, have been regarded 
with some respect, and treated with some decency by 
even the consummate flower of evolution — the head of 
the scientific agnostics. The expectation was ill- 
founded. He pours the gall and wormwood of sovereign 
contempt upon it and its doctrines. He pronounces its 
histories myths, spurns its God, spits upon its ethics, 
tramples under foot its cross, and vilifies its Holy Ghost. 
What right and title to arrogance so autocratic has 
one who affects to render worship to a "god of forces" — 
a blind, impersonal thing that is neither conscious of the 
worship paid to it, nor of evolving the worshipper, nor 
of its own existence ? I have not spoken depreciatingly 
of Mr. Spencer's powers. He is a giant. He has piled 
mountain upon mountain of scientific facts ; but stand- 
ing like a Titan upon the loftiest peak, and wielding 
the thunder-bolts of modern scientific hypotheses, he 
will be disappointed in reaching the heavens and scaling 
the battlements of biblical truth. He vividly describes 
the fright that seizes religion "when face to face with 
science." 1 Is he not mistaken % Why should religion — 
the true religion — be frightened ? Has she not, without 
alarm, looked in the face the deists of Britain, the 
encyclopedists of France, and, more formidable than 
they, the rationalistic scholars and the transcendental 
philosophers of Germany ? She still survives ; and it is 
hardly probable that she would tremble lest the Bible's 
1 First Prin., p. 101. 



Spexcee's Agnostic Philosophy. 433 

consistent philosophy of creation should be overthrown 
by a new speculative system, the cohesive principle of 
which is that of self-contradiction, the parts of which 
are only restrained from flying to pieces through the 
force of mutual repulsion by the temporary constriction 
of ^fr. Spencer's genius. 

Mr. Spencer's system is not philosophical enough to 
be entitled to the designation human, for it conditions 
its success upon the suppression of the common reason 
and the common sentiment of mankind. It is not 
religious enough to be honored by the epithet heathenish, 
for the heathen profess to worship some god. The 
Athenians were religious enough to erect an altar to 
the unknown God; the agnostics can erect no altar, 
unless it be one inscribed to the Unknowable Mystery. 
Yet they tell us that they have a religion. "What can its 
essence be but folly? what its ritual but pompous jar- 
gon ? There would seem to be but one resort to them — 
to worship themselves as the highest products of evolu- 
tion ; and that would be tantamount to worshipping 
incarnate self-contradictions. One would prefer to pay 
his homage to abstract logic, for that has, at least, the 
merit of being self -consistent, and is chargeable with no 
moral defect. 

The foreo'oing argument has not been concerned about 
the scientific aspects of Ifr. Spencer's system, but about 
his fundamental assumptions. Grant him his cry: 
Great is the Diana of Evolution ! — and the maid of 
frozen chastity may. for aught one cares, be the prolific 
mother of ever so numerous a progeny of rotations, 
differentiations, segregations, and equilibrations; may 



434 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

even be given to habitual dissipation, which may bring 
on dissolution. It is this great Diana of evolution and 
her reputed sire — Blind Energy — whose existence has 
been challenged as a creation of Spencerian mythology. 
It is such substitutes for providence and for God that 
one labors for ability to contemn. 

It will only be added that, in one respect, it may be 
conceded, Mr. Spencer has furnished a conspicuous 
proof of the evolution for which he contends. His 
system is an instance of a homogeneous nebula, revolving 
in circles, differentiating wonderfully into the hetero- 
geneous, and destined by an inevitable dissipation of 
force to ultimate in dissolution. 



"PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY." 



SUCH is the somewhat remarkable title of what 
claims to be a new and progressive science. It has 
been observed by more than one writer favorable to 
the new science, that most of those who have written 
in regard to the question have been professed physiolo- 
gists. This fact is significant, in view of the ground 
assumed by many, that this new science is destined to 
work a revolutionary change in what they call "the old 
psychology." The psychologist is advertised that the 
form in which he has been accustomed to view and to 
state his science must undergo important, and, it may be, 
radical alterations. He is informed that his method of 
inquiry has not been sufficiently scientific — that is, that 
he has not proceeded by experiment, the results of which 
can be tested by external observation. To the psycholo- 
gist, therefore, the questions raised by what is called the 
science of Physiological Psychology are of very great 
significance. They involve the right of psychology to be 
regarded as an independent science. 

In any treatment of this subject, almost everything 
will depend upon the point of view from which it is 
contemplated. We may assume or deny the assumption, 
that the mind and the body are essentially different, that 
the former is spiritual, the latter material. If we adopt 
the first supposition — namely, that the mind and the 



436 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

body are different substantive entities — it would follow 
that as they cannot be reduced to unity, cannot be 
treated as identical, there are two different sciences 
which are conversant about them respectively. As all 
sciences are defined from the object-matter about which 
they are concerned, we would have to consider psychology 
as the science which is concerned about the mind, and 
physiology as one of the sciences which are concerned 
about the body. They could no more be reduced to the 
unity of one and the same science than could the mind 
and the body be reduced to the unity of one and the same 
substantive entity. 

But as the mind and the bodily organism are obviously 
related to each other, as they act and react upon one 
another, there may be, even upon the assumption of 
their essential difference, a special science which would 
be concerned about their relation — a science which may, 
notwithstanding its objectionable ambiguity, be con- 
ceded the title of physiological psychology. 

The subject, however, may be contemplated from 
another point of view. The second supposition may be 
adopted; and the inquiry may begin, either with the 
assumption of the substantive identity of mind and 
body, or with the assumption that such an identity may 
be proved by a thorough-going series of experiments. 

It is not here proposed, even were there ability to do 
so, to enter into an exposition or discussion of the details 
of the subject. What is intended is, first, to make some 
remarks concerning the one science of physiological 
psychology, in accordance with the claim that it can 
only be admitted to exist as contradistinguished to physi- 



"Physiological Psychology/'' 437 

ology on the one hand, and to psychology on the other; 
secondly, to offer some criticisms npon the counter-claim 
that physiology and psychology are reducible to the 
unity of one and the same science, with the name of 
physiological psychology ; and, thirdly, to consider the 
ultimate ground upon which it is claimed that what have 
been usually regarded as the two different, but related, 
sciences of physiology and psychology may be reduced 
to unity as one and the same science — to-wit, that the 
mind and the body are, in the last analysis, not two 
different, although related, entities, but one and the 
same entity. 

I. Let us begin with the admission of the legitimacy 
of the attempt to construct a science which is concerned 
about the relations of the mind and the body; and the 
term mind is here used, not in its restricted sense as 
synonymous with the intellect proper, the cognitive 
power, but in its widest signification, as employed inter- 
changeably with the term soul. 

1. The most satisfactory work upon this subject, on 
the whole, which I have encountered is the Physiological 
Psychology of Prof. G. T. Ladd, of Yale University. 
It is sufficiently elaborate to satisfy a not extravagant 
demand for minuteness of detail ; it is marked by con- 
spicuous ability; and it is impartial enough to disarm 
of most of their prejudices both the pure psychologist 
and the pure physiologist. One can perceive no ground 
at all for discontent on the part of the latter, since the 
bulk of the work is occupied with physiological investi- 
gation and exposition, and the former, although at first 



438 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

lie may feel that too much is conceded for him, and may 
tremble for fear the ark of his science may be surren- 
dered to the materialistic physiologist, will be likely, 
ere he gets through, to see that his apprehensions were 
groundless. As Professor Ladd is one of the fairest and 
and most moderate of the advocates of a physiological 
psychology, let us hear him in explanation of the 
science : 

" We may define Physiological Psychology as the science which 
investigates the phenomena of human consciousness from the 
'physiological' point of view or method of approach. Remember- 
ing the cautions which have already been expressed, we may also 
say that it is the science of the human mind as investigated by 
means of its relations to the human physical organism. A 
more accurate definition, however, requires that something further 
be said concerning the nature and method of that science which 
furnishes the adjective [physiological] to our compound term. 
Human physiology is the science of the functions (or modes of 
the behavior in its correlated action) of the human physical 
organism. As studied at present it implies an acquaintance with 
the fields of gross and special microscopic anatomy (histology), 
of embryology and the general doctrine of development, of biology, 
— including the allied phenomena of plant life, — of molecular 
physics and chemistry as related to the structure and action of 
the bodily tissues, and of other forms of kindred knowledge. It is 
only a relatively small part of this vast domain, however, with 
which Physiological Psychology has directly to deal; for it is 
only a part of the human organism which has any direct relation 
to the phenomena of consciousness. As will appear subsequently, 
it is with the nervous system alone that our science has its chief 
immediate concern. Indeed, it might be described — though in a 
still somewhat indefinite, but more full and complete, way — as the 
science which investigates the correlations that exist between the 
structure and the functions of the human nervous mechanism and 
the phenomena of consciousness, and which derives therefrom 
conclusions as to the laws and nature of the mind." x 

1 Phys. Psychology, p. 4. 



"Physiological Psychology/' 439 

In this descriptive definition of the science with which 
he is dealing, Professor Ladd, first, acknowledges, if he- 
is not misunderstood, that it is concerned about the 
relations of mind and body as constituting its proper 
object-matter, and so far the psychologist, holding, as 
he does, to the existence of the mind as a separate 
essence, has nothing to object; but, secondly, one look- 
ing at this account of the science from that point of view 
of the psychologist is hardly prepared to receive, without 
some qualifying explanation, the statement that, investi- 
gating a the correlations that exist between the structure 
and the functions of the human nervous mechanism and 
the phenomena of consciousness," physiological psychol- 
ogy "derives therefrom conclusions as to the laws and 
nature of the mind." The psychologist admits that, 
from these "correlations," it is legitimate to derive con- 
clusions as to the modes in which the mind receives 
impressions from the bodily organism, and through it 
from the external world, and in which it transmits its 
activities to the bodily organism, and through it to the 
external world ; and also as to the laws by which that 
interaction of the mind and external matter is con- 
trolled. But he is not ready to concede that from that 
source conclusions may be derived as to the nature of 
the mind itself, and the laws by which that nature is 
governed. This science is concerned about the correla- 
tions of mind and body, and not directly about the 
nature and the laws of either the mind or the body. 
Psychology, the peculiar province of which is to deal 
with the one, and physiology, the distinctive office of 
which is to deal with the other, furnish the conditions 



440 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

upon which the construction of this new science becomes 
possible; but it is no more competent to talk of the 
physiologist, as such — investigating the laws and nature 
of the mind itself — than to speak of the psychologist, as 
such — discharging a similar office in regard to the 
nervous mechanism itself. This we must maintain, or 
acknowledge — what most of the cultivators of the new 
science claim — the unity of psychology and physiology, 
and consequently the unity of mind and body. 

2. It is an undeniable fact that the mind and the 
body are intimately related, that they constantly act and 
react upon each other. The induction upon which this 
generalization is based is too wide, too extended, too 
continuous to allow of any question as to its validity. 
There is no need to enter into specifications. The 
strictest psychologist must admit that the body acts upon 
and influences the mind, and the strictest physiologist 
must confess that the mind acts upon and influences the 
body. It is this closeness of intimacy, this uniformity 
of interaction between the two, which, considered by 
itself alone, occasions the possibility of idealism, or of 
materialism, or of absolute identity. It gives rise to a 
presumption in favor of either a "two-faced unity" or 
an absolute unity, a presumption which must be checked 
by other facts derived from the constitution of the body 
and the nature of the mind. This admitted reciprocal 
influence renders a "psycho-physical" science legitimate 
and interesting — a science which shall be devoted to the 
investigation of the facts, the nature, and the laws per- 
taining to that influence. Let the development of the 
science proceed. It is sometimes more than hinted that 



"Physiological Psychology." 441 

the psychologist would discourage its cultivation because 
lie fears that materialism may be established. With 
equal justice might it be intimated that the physiologist 
would be opposed to its advancement because of his 
apprehension that idealism may be proved. 

Certainly the psychologist entertains no fear that the 
mind will ever be evinced to be material. Whether, 
upon the supposition of the essential difference betwixt 
spirit and matter, this new science will, in the attempt 
to solves the problem of the mode of their interaction, 
succeed better than the old methods of solution furnished 
by the hypotheses of physical influence, of a plastic 
medium, of occasional causes, and of preestablished har- 
mony, remains to be seen. The presumption against its 
success is formidable; but modern science, like the 
lamp of Aladdin, is achieving undreamt-of wonders. 
Perhaps it may yet throw a bridge across this hitherto 
impassable chasm. That it will ever avail to show that 
the problem is non-existent, that there is no chasm, and, 
therefore, no bridge is needed, credat Judaeus Apella, 
non ego. 

3. The conditions required for the development of a 
science of physiological psychology are such that it must 
prove an extremely difficult thing to reach trustworthy 
and satisfactory results. It has been remarked that 
"young inquirers are rushing into the field as adven- 
turers do to a newly-discovered mine." Let them rush, 
but it behooves them to sit down and count the cost of 
the enterprise, the conditions which are necessary to its 
successful prosecution. 

(1.) In order to one's thorough-going evolution of the 



442 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

science, he will need to possess a competent knowledge 
both of psychology and physiology, for the reason that 
each is necessary to supply the means by which this 
intermediary science can alone be constructed. Not 
that, as has already been intimated, it is meant that 
they supply the materials out of which a physiological 
psychology is to be built up ; for that would be to sup- 
pose it a composite science, a supposition which is here 
thrown out of account ; but they give knowledge without 
which, as presupposed, no progress could be made in its 
origination or development. In order to understand the 
relation between psychology and physiology, both terms 
of the relation must be understood. Neither a mere 
psychologist nor a mere physiologist could be a physio- 
logical psychologist. He must be both a psychologist 
and a physiologist. The difficulty which would attend 
the attempt to master both of these sciences sufficiently 
to qualify one to construct a new science depending upon 
them, in a great degree, for its trustworthy development 
— this difficulty is enough to deter the youthful rushers 
into the new field from haste in reaching, and especially 
in emitting, their conclusions. Some smatterers, how- 
ever, alike in psychology and physiology, armed with a 
vocabulary of technicalities, have announced the conclu- 
sion that the "old psychology," which began with the 
mistakes of Aristotle, and has for ages perpetuated itself 
through the blunders of misled genius, blunders blindly 
followed by such men as Descartes and Locke, Reid, 
Stewart and Hamilton, having come to the hour of 
doom, must yield to the stabs of Fechner, Helmholtz 
and Wundt, of Ribot, Spencer and Bain, and folding 



" Physiological Psychology/'' 443 

its musty drapery about it, fall gracefully at the base of 
Herbart's statue. A little more mastery of both psychol- 
ogy and physiology, accompanied by a little more 
modesty, would suggest some delay in gazetting the 
death of the old psychology. 

(2.) This is not all. !Not only must there be a compe- 
tent understanding of the sciences of psychology and 
physiology, but the relations between the mind and the 
nervous organism must — at least to some tolerable 
extent — be understood. These relations, according to 
most of the more recent investigators, exist in the region 
of the brain. Now a psycho-physical science, it is 
acknowledged by all its advocates, proceeds, on its physi- 
cal side, by the method of external observation and 
physical experiment. It follows that, in order to its 
being adequate, this method must be employed upon the 
brain of the living subject — the living subject, because 
there are no activities in the brain of a dead man. It is 
evident that the relations to be observed and experi- 
mented upon are between psychical and physical activi- 
ties. The brain of the living, active man must, there- 
fore, be the object of observation and experiment. E~o 
post mortem process will answer. The obvious difficul- 
ties in the way of such experimentation have been con- 
fessed by writers of opposite schools. M. Ribot, who 
pronounces absurd the question of the relations between 
the soul and the body as distinct substances, and talks 
approvingly of "a psychology without a soul," says : 

"As the whole experimental method reposes definitely in the 
principle of causation, physiological psychology has two systems 
of means at its disposal: to determine effects from their causes 
(for example, sensation from excitation) ; to determine causes 



444 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

from their effects (internal states from the actions that exhibit 
them). There is, moreover, need that one, at least, of the two 
terms of this indissoluble couple called the causal nexus be out- 
side of ourselves, outside of consciousness; that there be a 
physical happening as such accessible to experiment. Without 
this condition, the experimental method cannot be employed. In 
the order of the phenomena that we call purely internal (the 
reproduction of ideas, their association, etc. ) , the cause and effect 
are in ourselves. Although we cannot doubt that the law of 
causality reigns there as elsewhere; although, in some cases, the 
cause can with certainty be determined; yet, as both causes and 
effects are in us, and give no external value, their physical con- 
comitants being little known or inaccessible, all experimental 
research in what concerns them is necessarily impossible." x 

Professor Ladd makes these striking observations : 

" Exner has well said that 'a physiology of the cerebral cortex 
in the sense in which there is a physiology of the muscle, etc., 
scarcely exists at the present time.' The reasons for such a de- 
ficiency lie partly in the very nature of this organ, and the place 
it holds within the animal economy; as well as partly, perhaps, 
in certain prejudices which have hindered the physical theory of 
a material structure so intimately related to the action of the 
mind. The cerebral cortex of the animals is experimentally ap- 
proached only by overcoming immense difficulties. Moreover, 
those physical and chemical processes of the cerebral substances, 
to which we must look for any strictly scientific understanding of 
its physiology, are placed almost utterly beyond reach of investi- 
gation. Reasoning must fill up with conjecture the great gaps 
that lie between a very complex series of physical occurrences, 
only a part of which are observable, on the one side, and on the 
other, an equally complex group of psychical occurrences." 2 

It must be confessed that the difficulties which oppose 
the attainment of any definite results from experimental 
observation are very great, both on the side of the bodily 

1 German Psychol, of To-day. Trans, by Prof. J. M. Baldwin, 
pp. 13, 14. 

2 Physiol. Psychology, p. 254. 



"Physiological Psychology." 445 

organism and on that of the conscious mind. On the 
side of the body, there is the opacity of the cranium, 
which debars direct observation, except in cases in which 
parts of it are removed by injury; and even then the 
area of the brain that is disclosed to view is small, and 
the injury itself which causes the aperture induces an 
abnormal condition of the nervous system. The three 
lines of evidence bearing on the action of the brain, 
which, according to Professor Ladd's statement, are 
usually relied upon, are so imperfect that their results 
are matters of debate among experimenters and ob- 
servers themselves. These are the evidences from ex- 
perimentation, from pathology, and from histology and 
comparative anatomy. These, even so far as they go, are 
attended with doubt and uncertainty, and are employed 
often, not without danger and not without hindrance, on 
ethical grounds ; but the chief consideration is that they 
cannot, from the nature of the case, go far enough to 
yield satisfactory results. The analogy furnished by 
experiments upon the brain of living animals cannot be 
verified by similar experiments upon the brain of the 
living human subject. The inferential argument, de- 
rived from this source, is, to a great extent, a mere 
begging of the question. 

On the side of the mind, the difficulties are no less 
formidable. Here the appeal must be to consciousness 
alone; but consciousness is a very poor informant in 
regard to the states, or even the activities, of the brain, 
and, consequently, of the relations subsisting between 
them and the states and activities of the mind. We 
know by experience that we are far more distinctly con- 



446 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

scions of a cramp in a finger or a toe than we are of the 
molecular agitations in the mass of the cerebrum. 

Were it supposed that, under the application of some 
powerful electric light, the cranium might be rendered 
transparent, and the inner structure of the brain of a 
sound living man be revealed to microscopic observation, 
it might happen that a synchronous correspondence 
would be noticeable between certain acts of the mind 
and certain movements in the cerebral mass; but even 
upon that extraordinary supposition — not yet realized 
in fact — it would be impossible to observe the mental 
acts themselves, and might be impossible to observe the 
corresponding agitations in the cerebral nerves ; for, if, 
when some great nerve is under the dissecting knife, 
laid open to inspection, no microscope reveals its molec- 
ular movements, what reason would there be for believ- 
ing that such movements would be perceptible in the 
extremely attenuated nerves which ramify through the 
physical mass of the brain ? 

Such are some of the difficult conditions upon which, 
with the admission of an essential difference between 
the mind and the body, the attempt must be made to 
construct a psycho-physical science. Such a science may 
be legitimate, and may be in the process of formation, 
but the likelihood is that, whatever may be its growth, 
it must ever continue to be incomplete. Its advance- 
ment towards perfection must be, for obvious reasons, 
more difficult than that of either psychology or physi- 
ology, between which it mediates, and the relations of 
which, inadequately mastered as they themselves are, it 
professes to expound. Still, so long as it is not denied 



"Physiological Psychology/'' 447 

that psychology and physiology are different and incom- 
miscible sciences, growing out of the substantive and 
indestructible difference between the 'immortal spirit 
and its mortal environment, it is not intended to dis- 
parage the claims or the aspirations of a psycho-physical 
science. What it is designed to say is that the old 
psychologist, and the old physiologist as well, will be 
more apt to reap substantial fruits, each from the culti- 
vation of his own field, than will this new adventurer — 
the physiological psychologist; and to this opinion one 
is naturally led by the fact that the labors which have 
so far been expended in the new field have chiefly inured 
to the advantage of physiology, notwithstanding that 
the title Physiological Psychology seems to be in the 
interest of psychology. 

II. I proceed to submit some criticisms upon the 
claim that psychology and physiology are reducible to 
unity as one and the same science, under the names of 
physiological psychology and psycho-physics. 

1. The presumption is mightily against this claim. 
From the days of Plato and Aristotle, the great body 
of philosophers, scholars and scientific thinkers have 
admitted the distinction between the sciences of psychol- 
ogy and physiology — a distinction founded upon the 
conceded difference between the mind and the body. 
This presumption can neither be ignored nor despised. 
It is venerable and deserves to be treated with respect. 
It is true that there have been pure idealists and pure 
materialists. They were naturally led, by their funda- 
mental assumption of monism, to regard the science of 



448 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

mind and that of matter as radically one ; and the logic 
of their views consistently enforced the reduction of the 
generally acknowledged two sciences to unity. They, 
however, have been exceptions to the general rule. This 
class, let it be observed, were pure idealists or pure ma- 
terialists. Such men, for instance, as Plato and Berke- 
ley, although predominantly idealistic, could not be 
included in it. Neither could Aristotle be assigned to it, 
although predominantly empirical, since he admitted a 
distinction between matter and spirit. This was the 
judgment of so profound a historian of philosophy as 
Schwegler; and Sir W. Hamilton, whose learning as 
a critic of philosophy has perhaps never been surpassed, 
argued to prove that Aristotle was a natural realist. 

To this it must be added that by no means all of the 
modern advocates of psycho-physics have favored the 
reduction of psychology and physiology to unity as one 
and the same science. Those who have done so are as 
yet exceptional thinkers, such as Helmholtz, Ribot and 
perhaps Wundt, on the continent, and the British 
writers Spencer and Bain. Lotze is charged by Ribot, 
in his German Psychology of To-day, not only with 
having been too pure a psychologist, but with having 
been too much of a metaphysician. Even Fechner, who 
is represented as deriving his "true glory" from his 
work in psycho-physics, is quoted by the reviewer of the 
German psychology as saying: "I understand by 
psycho-physics an exact theory of the relations of soul 
and body, and, in a general way, of the physical world 
and the psychical world." M. Ribot himself thus pro- 
ceeds to interpret Fechner's doctrine : 



"Physiological Psychology/' 449 

" The sciences of nature, long since in possession of their 
principles and method, are upon a road of continuous progress. 
On the other hand, the sciences of spirit — psychology and logic 
at least, have also had their foundations in a measure laid. On 
the contrary, the science of the reciprocal relations of body and 
spirit is far less advanced than the two groups of sciences just 
named, between which it occupies an intermediate position." 

To all this, no doubt, it will be answered, that science 
has broken the shackles of mediaeval despotism, that it 
is no longer amenable to authority, and that it has de- 
monstrated by actual instances its right and its ability 
to revolutionize the opinions of the world. All this may 
be conceded. The liberty of science to pursue its inde- 
pendent investigations is now, on almost all hands, 
freely admitted. It is as vain to check it as to attempt to 
put a yoke upon light. The effort may be relegated to 
the Vatican as the heir of mediaeval principles. But 
there are two considerations which cannot be over- 
looked. 

In the first place, opinions which have been univer- 
sally held have never yet been revolutionized by unveri- 
fied hypotheses, whether those opinions have been phil- 
osophical, scientific or religious. They constituted 
presumptions that had to be overthrown by proofs. In 
some cases the proofs have rebutted the presumptions, 
but there have been others, in which the proofs have 
demolished the hypotheses, and the old doctrines have 
held their seat. Let the proofs be furnished that the 
soul and the body are not — as they have been believed to 
be from the beginning of the world — different entities, 
and the proofs will consequently be supplied that the 
sciences of psychology and physiology are not — as has 



450 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

been generally maintained — two distinct sciences. 
Until the proofs are forthcoming, no ingenious hypothe- 
sis will rebut the presumption derived from the ancient 
faith of the race. 

In the second place, the instances in which a thorough- 
going revolution of opinion has been effected have occur- 
red in the physical or in the speculative sphere. In the 
former, may be mentioned the opinions formerly held 
as to the centre of the solar system, the figure of the 
earth and the existence of antipodes ; in the latter, the 
views which prevailed among philosophers, that a mental 
image intervenes in sense-perception between the per- 
cipient subject and the external object, and that con- 
sciousness is restricted to the cognizance of subjective 
phenomena ; but in the moral sphere the case is different. 
The geo-cerutric theory as to the planetary system has 
been demolished, but the theo-centric theory as to the 
moral system never has, although atheists, both scientific 
and philosophic, have been hammering at it for ages. 
So with regard to the accountability of man to a moral 
lawgiver and ruler, the seat of responsibility in the 
personal self, the existence of conscience, and the like. 
The doctrines concerned about the foundations of morals 
and religion have always stood, and stand now, impreg- 
nable. They have never been revolutionized. Now the 
hypothesis which is here combatted strikes at the very 
foundations of morals and religion. Science — some 
science — may elaborately try to prove that there is no 
real difference between a moral principle and a sensa- 
tion. If it succeed, it would accomplish the moral 
disintegration of society, and plant its flag of triumph 



"Physiological Psychology/' 451 

upon the wreck ; if it fail, it must experience the fate of 
the unsuccessful revolutionist. Science is free; let it 
revolutionize, if it can, for, as Burke says, "Hoary- 
headed error is not the more venerable on that account. 7 ' 
If it cannot, it will have to confess that hoary-headed 
truth has on that account a venerable presumption in its 
favor. 

2. The investigations of the sciences of psychology 
and physiology proceed by different methods. 

(1.) It is uot designed to say that the ultimate source 
of authority in these sciences is different. In both the 
appeal for ultimate authority must be made to conscious- 
ness. Neither can reach higher proof than conscious- 
ness; and, therefore, both stand, in this regard, upon 
the same foot. The claim, although often preferred by 
the exalters of natural science in contradistinction to 
mental, is utterly inadmissible that the proof of the 
body's existence and activities rests upon surer ground 
than that of the mind's. Ultimately, the proof of the 
former depends upon the testimony of consciousness. 
Let the question be asked, Why am I sure of bodily 
pleasure or pain as facts? and the answer must be, 
Because I am conscious of them. The ground of cer- 
tainty is the same as that upon which I depend in regard 
to mental phenomena — I am conscious of them. Take 
away consciousness, and what would remain of our 
knowledge of the phenomenal changes in our own 
bodies ? As much as remains to the body in the coffin, 
to a corpse shocked by galvanism or undergoing the 
process of cremation. 

(2.) Eor is it intended to say that the statement of 



452 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

the difference between the sciences is satisfactory, which 
is sometimes made — namely, that one pursues the 
method of internal, the other the method of external, 
observation. The inquiry at once arises, as observation 
implies an observer, What is the observer % Manifestly, 
the mind ; for no one would be so destitute of mind as 
to assert that observation may proceed without a mind 
to observe ; but observation by the mind, whether inter- 
nal or external, is precisely consciousness. The mind's 
instrument of observation is its consciousness. So that, 
whether the mind observes internal or external phe- 
nomena, its chief, its primary instrument of observa- 
tion is attention, which is but intensified consciousness. 
In this respect, therefore, the sciences of psychology and 
physiology are not different, but similar. 

So far for the observer and the main instrument of 
observation ; but if the question be, What is it which is 
observed % what the objects upon which observation 
terminates ? the answer must be : in the one case, that of 
internal observation, the phenomena of the mind ; in the 
other, that of external' observation, the phenomena of 
the body, and one cannot help pausing to say that the 
admission of a difference between the two methods pi 
internal and'external observation is the admission of the 
difference between the two sciences employing them, 
each being concerned about an object-matter different 
from that with which the other deals. There could be 
no unification of these sciences. 

(3.) The real difference between the methods of the 
two sciences is that one proceeds purely by conscious- 
ness, while the other, besides involving consciousness, 



"Physiological Psychology/' 453 

proceeds by experiment with material, or, if that word 
be objected to, mechanical instruments. Psychology 
knows no instrument of investigation but consciousness, 
becoming, in this relation, introspection. Physiology 
uses the hand, the scalpel, the microscope, the galvanic 
battery, the electric machine, mechanical excitants, and 
nicely constructed contrivances for measuring the in- 
tensity of influences upon the nervous system, and the 
time occupied by the passage of nerve-currents from the 
end-organs of the body to the brain, and from the brain 
to those organs. The living subject is here spoken of. 
Upon the body of a dead man other instruments, chemi- 
cal, for example, may be employed ; but how such 'post 
mortem experiments could prove anything in regard to 
psychic states or acts, it may be left to him to show who 
maintains the identity of psychology and physiology. 

The claim which such a scientist sets up is preposter- 
ous, that the activities of the mind can be measured. To 
pretend that physical measurements can be applied to 
the mind, in any sense, is miserably to beg the question 
of the unity of the mind and the body ; and if the pure 
materialist has never yet, by all the ingenuity of the 
most elaborate arguments, succeeded in reducing the 
mind and the bodily organism to the unity of one sub- 
stantive entity, it is not likely that it will be accom- 
plished by the materialistic psycho-physicist through 
measurements with his mechanical instruments. His 
measurements necessarily are judged of by the senses. 
Can they penetrate into the arcana of the mind ? When 
he can see a thought, or hear a feeling, or touch a voli- 
tion, when he can taste a moral judgment, or smell a 



454 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

religious sentiment — lie may succeed in applying to 
them his mechanical instruments; hardly until then. 
He deceives himself when he supposes that in measuring 
the physical he is measuring the psychical. These meas- 
urements must be understood as applicable only to the 
physical conditions upon which mental energy, intellec- 
tual, aesthetical, voluntary or moral is manifested. They 
can only be expressed in the terms of physical science, 
and it is absurd — at least, it begs the question — to 
assume their applicability to the mental energies, con- 
sidered as such. These energies cannot be subjected to 
physical measurement, either as regards intensity or 
time. 

It deserves to be considered, further, that the measure- 
ments, such as they are, are of necessity only partial. 
A sympathetic reviewer in the Encyclopedia Britannica 
of Weber's law [concerning the measurement of psychic 
phenomena] makes these remarks : 

" Weber's law, it must be added, holds only within certain 
limits. In the 'chemical' senses of taste and smell experiments 
are almost impossible. It is not practicable to limit the amount 
of the stimulus with the necessary exactitude, and the results 
are further vitiated by the long continuance of the physiological 
effects. The same considerations apply with still more force to 
the organic sensations, and the results in the case of temperature 
sensations are completely uncertain. The law is approximately 
true in the case of sight, hearing, pressure, and the muscular 
sense — most exactly in the case of sound. As this is the sense 
which affords the greatest facilities for measuring the precise 
amount of the stimulus, it may perhaps be inferred that, if we 
could attain the same exactitude in the other senses, with the 
elimination of the numerous disturbing influences at work, the 
law would vindicate itself with the same exactitude and certainty. 
It is further to be noted, however, that even in those senses in 
which it has been approximately verified, the law holds with 



"Physiological Psychology/' 455 

stringency only within certain limits. The results are most exact 
in the middle regions of the sensory scale; on the contrary, when 
we approach the upper or lower limit of sensibility, they become 
quite uncertain." 

But lest this citation from even an advocate of 
Weber's law of psychic measurement should be imputed 
to the anxiety of "Dr. Dry-as-dust" to save the old 
psychology from utter discomfiture, let us listen to the 
words of the canonist of scientific experimentation, the 
able expounder of the philosophy of associational empi- 
ricism. Says John Stuart Mill : 

" But if, on the other hand, it is out of our power to produce 
the phenomenon, and we have to seek for instances in which 
nature produces it, the task before us is one of quite a different 
kind. Instead of being able to choose what the concomitant cir- 
cumstances shall be, we have now to discover what they are; 
which, when we go beyond the simplest and most accessible cases, 
it is next to impossible to do, with any precision and complete- 
ness. Let us take, as an exemplification of a phenomenon which 
we have no means of fabricating artificially, a human mind. 
Nature produces many; but the consequence of our not being able 
to produce it by art is, that in every instance in which we see a 
human mind developing itself, or acting upon other things, we 
see it surrounded and obscured by an indefinite multitude of 
unascertainable circumstances, rendering the use of experimental 
methods almost delusive. We may conceive to what extent this 
is true, if we consider, among other things, that whenever nature 
produces a human mind, she produces, in close connection with 
it, also a body; that is, a vast complication of physical facts, in 
no two cases perhaps exactly similar, and most of which (except 
the mere structure, which we can examine in a sort of coarse way 
after it has ceased to act) are radically out of the reach of our 
means of exploration. If, instead of a human mind, we suppose 
the subject of investigation to be a human society or state, all the 
same difficulties recur in a greatly augmented degree. 

" We have thus already come within sight of a conclusion, 
which the progress of the inquiry will, I think, bring before us 
with the clearest evidence; namely, that in the sciences which 



456 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

deal with phenomena in which artificial experiments are impos- 
sible (as in the case of astronomy), or in which they have a very 
limited range (as in physiology, mental philosophy, and the 
social science), induction from direct experience is practiced at 
a disadvantage generally equivalent to impracticability; from 
which it follows that the methods of those sciences in order to 
accomplish anything worthy of attainment must be, to a great 
extent, if not principally, deductive." * 

Mr. Mill was a stout maintainer of the derivation of 
all our knowledge from experience, but lie did not sink 
the mind and the body, on the one hand, or, on the other, 
psychology and physiology into absolute unity. The 
judicious considerations just quoted from such a man 
ought to bridle the impetuosity of the rushers, mechani- 
cal apparatus in hand, into the field of physiological 
psychology, in order to demonstrate by physical meas- 
urement of psychic acts that the mind and the brain are 
the same, and that psychology and physiology are 
reducible to unity. 

(4.) This argument going to show that, in view of the 
fact that psychology and physiology proceed in their 
investigations by different methods, they cannot be one 
and the same science, is, in some quarters, met by a 
denial that they employ different methods, and the asser- 
tion that they use but one method — or, at least, ought to 
use but one method. The method of "internal observa- 
tion and reasoning" (or, as Stuart Mill calls it, deduc- 
tion) is inadequate, false, effete. The old psychology, 
therefore, which employed that method must give way 
to the new-comer, physiological psychology, or experi- 
mental psychology. Its day is over, and it must be 

1 Logic, Am. Ed., pp. 219, 220. 



"Physiological Psychology/'* 457 

summarily consigned to oblivion. This is the position 
boldly maintained by M. Ribot, who, by the way, refers 
to Stuart Mill as sustaining him; but if the passage 
above cited from Mr. Mill is taken into consideration, 
it appears that the appeal to his authority, in this par- 
ticular matter, is erroneous and vain. The passages in 
which M. Ribot assumes this stand are so dogmatic and 
supercilious that several extracts will be given. They 
will serve to indicate the animus and drift of some 
magnifiers of the science of psycho-physics. 

"Although it has cut a good figure enough, the old psychology 
is doomed. In the new surroundings that have recently grown up 
the conditions of its existence have disappeared. Its methods do 
not suffice for the increasing difficulties of the task, for the grow- 
ing exigencies of the scientific spirit. It is compelled to live upon 
its past. In vain its wisest representatives attempt a compromise, 
and repeat in a loud voice that it is necessary to study facts, to 
accord a large share to experience. Their concessions amount 
to nothing. However sincere their intentions, in fact they do not 
execute them. As soon as they put hand to the work, the taste 
for pure speculation seizes upon them. Besides, no reform is 
possible of that which is radically false, and the old psychology 
rests upon an illegitimate conception, and should perish with 
the contradictions that are in it. The efforts that are made to 
accommodate it to the exigencies of the modern spirit, to work a 
change in its real nature, bring only delusion. Its essential 
characteristics remain always the same; one can show it in few 
words. In the first place, it is possessed of the metaphysical 
spirit; it is the 'science of the soul;' internal observation, 
analysis, and reasoning are its favorite processes of investigation; 
it distrusts biological science, associates with it only in reluctance 
and by necessity, and is ashamed to acknowledge its debt. Feeble 
and old, it makes no progress, and asks only to be let alone, that 
it may spend its age in peace. 1 .... 

" For the old school, since taste for internal observation and 

1 Germ. Psychol., etc. Tran., p. 2. 



458 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

subtilty of spirit were exclusive signs of a call to psychology, the 
programme summed itself up in two words — observation and rea- 
soning. Internal observation is, without doubt, the first step; 
there is always a necessary process of verification and interpreta- 
tion; but it cannot be a method [N. B.]. To maintain this is to 
forget or to disown entirely the conditions of a scientific method. 
If psychology can be constructed in this way, good eyes and fixed 
attention will suffice for the construction of physiology." * 

" For the vague and common-place formula of the 'relations of 
soul and body,' as the old school employs it, for the arbitrary and 
barren hypothesis of two substances acting upon each other, let us 
substitute the study of two phenomena which have, for each 
particular case, so constant a connection that they can be most 
exactly designated as one phenomenon of a double face." 2 

Upon these excerpts from a diatribe, with judicial 
solemnity consigning the old psychology — along with 
the old theology, of course — to a seat on the bank of the 
Lethe, there to suck its thumb and drivel upon its beard, 
until, in a fit of somnolence, it falls into the stream and 
its meaningless existence is ended, one cannot restrain a 
few reflections. 

First. The lofty disdain is admirable, with which 
M. Ribot uses his psycho-physical staff to castigate 
Aristotle, Scaliger and Leibnitz, Kant and Cousin, 
Locke and Reid, Stewart, Hamilton and the multitu- 
dinous host of the old psychologists. Begone, he cries, 
to your merited oblivion ! and, presto, they disappear 
into the chasm opened at the stamp of the great magi- 
cian, and its jaws close over them forever. 

Secondly. M. Ribot must have discovered a hitherto 

1 Germ. Psychol., etc., Tran. p. 3. 

2 Ibid., p. 8. One is reminded of Dr. Bain's "double-faced 
unity"; of the meaning of which it remains to inquire. Here 
we have explicitly a double-faced phenomenon; and the marvel is 
that it is two phenomena, and yet only one phenomenon! 



" Physiological Psychology/'' 459 

•unknown race of peculiarly wise psychologists, whom he 
represents as with loud outcries and vain attempts at 
compromise summoning their deaf brethren to the duty 
of paying attention to facts and experience. Does he 
mean to say that there is a class of psychologists who 
deny that mental phenomena are facts, and confine expe- 
rience to the external and sensible sphere? who regard 
consciousness as illusory in witnessing to the existence 
of subjective activities, and as discharging its whole 
office in testifying to nervous impressions ? If there be 
such a tribe of psychologists they would verily be rarae 
aves in terris, and M. Ribot would be entitled to the 
laurels of a discoverer. One craves to know who they 
are and where they may be found. 

Thirdly. Our learned critic finds fault with the old 
psychology, especially because it professes to be "a 
science of the soul/' whereas the truth is that the only 
genuine psychology is a "psychology without a soul." It 
has perpetrated the unpardonable blunder of supposing 
that there is any soul. It is thus founded on "an illegiti- 
mate conception." This is a damaging blow inflicted on 
the old psychology ; it knocks the spirit, all the life and 
soul, out of it ; but, without a pause to discuss the ques- 
tion whether there be no soul and the body is the whole 
of man, or to notice the remarkable admission made by 
M. Ribot, that he is a man of no soul, one may properly 
raise the inquiry with what consistency M. Ribot himself 
employs the term 'psychology. It certainly means, if 
anything, a discourse concerning the soul — it is a soul- 
logy. As M. Ribot expunges the psychical element — the 
soul — from man, he ought in consistency to strike out 



460 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

the psychical member in the word psychology, and 
reduce it to the significant term logy ; and then pursuing 
the path of consistent expurgation he ought to change 
the compound title physiological psychology into physio- 
logical logy ; but as M. Kibot is too much of a scholar to 
father that jargon, let him consummate his consistency 
by calling his science not physiological psychology, but 
what he really means — namely, physiology. 

Fourthly. To come directly to the point under con- 
sideration — that of method — it may be asked what 
M. Kibot can mean by his assertions concerning internal 
observation. 

In the first place, he says that there is no soul to be 
observed. Consequently, one must infer, internal obser- 
vation is an observation of nothing. The whole process 
or method (call it by what name you please) supposed 
to be pursued by the old, radically false, psychology is a 
delusion; but he also says, "Internal observation is, 
without doubt, the first step." As there is nothing to be 
internally observed, there can, of course, be no internal 
observation. Nevertheless, internal observation is the 
first step ! This contradiction could not be evaded by 
saying that the internal observation intended is one of 
external phenomena, one originating from within and 
terminating on facts without ; for observation is always 
defined from its object-matter. That is internal which 
is concerned about internal facts, that external which is 
concerned about external facts. If M. Kibot did not 
see this, or seeing it would deny, he may be a brilliant 
reciter of other men's opinions, but he has held his own 
powers of analysis and discrimination in reserve. 



"Physiological Psychology/' 461 

In the second place, although "internal observation 
is, without doubt, the first step" in the process of investi- 
gation, "it cannot be a method." This can only mean 
that it cannot be a whole method. Suppose that to be so, 
and where is the error in characterizing it as a part of 
a method, or as one of the methods pursued by psychol- 
ogy ? But if, argues he, internal observation is allowed 
to be a psychological method, external observation may 
with equal justice be regarded as a physiological method 
— which is absurd ; for " if psychology can be con- 
structed in this way, good eyes and fixed attention will 
suffice for the construction of physiology." Does 
M. Ribot mean gravely to affirm that physiology pro- 
ceeds alone by the method of experimentation ? What 
would experiment avail without observation ? Why, 
then, may not physiology be said to employ the methods 
of external observation and experiment ? but if so, what 
objection can there be to saying — as he himself inti- 
mates — that internal observation is one of the methods 
employed by psychology, the others being, according to 
his statement, "analysis and reasoning" ? All this is 
captious. As well might we say that it is wrong to 
speak of the methods of analysis and synthesis, or of 
analysis or synthesis being a method, inasmuch as they 
are only one method. It can make no material difference 
whether they be called two methods, each complemen- 
tary to the other, or one joint method. If M. Eibot 
admits that internal observation is the first step in inves- 
tigation — and he does — he concedes that it is the first 
element of a method, a legitimate method ; and then he 
contradicts himself, for he asserts that it is falsely 



462 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

employed by the old psychology. He might, however, 
reply that what he insists upon is the insufficiency of 
internal observation alone; the necessity of its results 
being verified and interpreted by external experiments ; 
and as the old psychology depended upon an internal 
observation which was not thus confirmed, its internal 
observation was worthless. This brings us to the next 
consideration. 

In the third place, M. Ribot assigns as a reason why 
internal observation is the first step in investigation this : 
a There is always a necessary process of verification and 
interpretation." The enunciation is ambiguous. It 
might be construed as meaning that internal observation 
precedes, or that it succeeds, verification and interpre- 
tation. If, as is probable, it be meant that it precedes 
them, and is verified and interpreted by them, it is 
confessed that the mind, as an independent observer, 
furnishes materials for verification and interpretation 
by external, physical experiment ; and then the question 
is given up, for it is clear that a mere physical phenome- 
non cannot observe itself, and submit its observations 
for confirmation by the physical experiments, either of 
itself, or of other phenomena like itself. M. Ribot may 
believe this-. There may have been men who believed 
that the moon is made of green cheese; which is about 
as reasonable as to believe that a physical phenomenon 
can observe, and experiment upon, itself. If it be meant 
that internal observation succeeds the verification and 
interpretation of external experiment, How can it be 
represented as the first step in the investigating process ? 
It may be said that this is an ungrounded supposition ; 



" Physiological Psychology/' 463 

but a recent writer, who is professedly a great admirer 
of Wunxlt, expressly says : "On the one hand, empirical 
investigation must precede rational interpretation, and 
this empirical investigation must be absolutely unham- 
pered by fetters of dogmatism and preconception ; on 
the other hand, rational interpretation must be equally 
free in its own province. . . . Empirical psychology 
must be concerned chiefly with the latter only as far as 
rational inferences can be confirmed empirically in the 
stage of development reached." This is indeed to secure 
the process at both ends, like the fastening of a suspen- 
sion bridge by a buttress at each extremity: physical 
experiment is verified by rational interpretation, and 
rational interpretation by physical experiment. 

So much is spoken ambiguously and unclearly in 
regard to internal observation, or introspection, that, to 
secure clearness, one is compelled to resort to a dilemma. 
Either the method of introspection supposes the soul, 
contradistinguished to the physical organism, or it does 
not. If the former, it is conceded that there are two 
distinct methods of investigation which cannot be con- 
founded. Internal observation would be concerned 
about the soul and external about the body — the one 
psychological in its character, the other physiological. 
It would follow that, as the tAvo methods could not be 
reduced to one, neither can the two sciences of psychol- 
ogy and physiology be brought into unity. 

If the latter, if the method of introspection does not 
suppose the soul as contradistinguished to the physical 
organism, it would indeed follow, from that supposition, 
that what is termed introspection would relate to the 



464 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

bodily organism alone. All that would be meant is that 
those parts of the body which are not superficial, but 
veiled from the senses, must be investigated by internal 
observation, and those parts which are subject to sensible 
inspection by external observation. Upon this hypothe- 
sis, however, the difference is acknowledged between 
internal and external observation. The question, then, 
must be pressed, What is the differentia of internal 
observation or introspection ? What peculiar and dis- 
tinctive office does it discharge ? The mind or the soul, 
as a psychical entity contradistinguished to the physical 
organism, has been discarded. It must be thought away. 
Consequently, the physical organism alone exists as the 
investigator and the object to be investigated. 'Now, 
what is the process by which the brain, the heart, the 
nerves afferent and efferent, are introspected? If the 
answer be, By consciousness, that implies, whatever else 
may be meant, a knowledge which something has of 
itself. Now, what is that something ? The reply to that 
question must not bring back the banished mind. It can- 
not, one must insist, be said to be a psychical something. 
That would be a soul, or the term is wrested from its 
obvious significance. It cannot be said to be a mental 
something, for that would be a mind. That which is 
mental, and at the same time not mind, is not only 
inconceivable, but self-contradictory. It must, there- 
fore, be a physical, a bodily, something. Using the 
brain as representative of the whole nervous system, for 
the sake of brevity and the avoidance of a cumbersome 
multiplication of terms, it comes to this, that the brain 
is conscious of itself. By its own consciousness it is 
capable of introspecting itself. 



"Physiological Psychology." 465 

But what does this amount to but maintaining that 
the brain has a mental power of internally observing 
itself? and what is this but to bring back the mind, 
which, by the hypothesis, was excluded. It is like the 
pitching out of nature with a fork; it is sure to come 
back again. No, it may be replied, there is no mental 
entity to which this power is to be attributed ; the men- 
tal power attaches to the brain itself; but it must be 
rejoined : That which has a mental power belonging to 
it must be a mental thing, a mental entity, else there is 
an incongruity between the nature of the power and the 
nature of the thing to which it belongs. It cannot be 
said that the power is independent, that it implies no 
entity to which it appertains, for it would follow that 
the power would not belong to the brain, and so it would 
not be the brain's power by which it is conscious of 
itself; which would be to contradict the supposition 
with which we set out — namely, that the brain knows 
itself by its consciousness. The only other supposition 
is that the consciousness, by which the brain knows 
itself, is a physical knowledge, a corporeal conscious- 
ness ; a position which is not only a pure paradox as 
traversing the common usage of mankind, but a flat con- 
tradiction to the particular usage of these very writers 
themselves, who uniformly speak of psychical and men- 
tal powers and entitle their science psycho-physics or 
physiological psychology. 

It will not do to say that the question is a superfluous 
one, for there is no introspection. That would involve 
self-contradiction. M. Eibot has already been quoted 
as maintaining that the first step in investigation is in- 



466 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

ternal observation ; and what is that but introspection ? 
The question, then, returns, What is the something 
which does the introspecting ? And, further, how does 
it accomplish it ? Is it contended that it is the brain 
which introspects itself % It must be asked, How ? If 
the answer be, that the brain knows itself by a power 
analogous to that which the old psychologist imputes 
to his supposititious but non-existent mind, that would 
simply be to deny and affirm a mind in the same 
breath: to deny that there is a mind which is not the 
brain, and to affirm that there is a mind which is the 
brain. 

This analysis leads us to a definite issue. He who 
denies that there are two separate but related methods 
of investigation — the one psychological, the other phys- 
iological, and affirms but one and the same method, 
takes this ground because, in his view, there are not two 
separate though related things to be investigated, but 
one and the same thing. This one thing is in one aspect 
psychical and in another physical. So the one method 
of its investigation is in one aspect psychical and in an- 
other physical. Consequently there are not two separate 
though related sciences, psychology and physiology, but 
one and the same science with two aspects — namely, 
psycho-physics or physiologico-psychology. Of course, 
a science of the relations between a psychical entity and 
a physical entity is, according to this view, an impos- 
sibility. 

The further consideration of this definite issue is for 
the present postponed, in order to give room for another 
specification in regard to method. 



" Physiological Psychology/'' 467 

Fifthly. The charge is preferred against the old 
psychologists, that they proceed upon the method of 
metaphysics. The point of this indictment is that, as 
they employed a false method, they reached a false 
result. Xo true psychology can be a product of the 
metaphysical method. The old psychology is such pro- 
duct; consequently, it must be regarded as a false 
psychology. The only true method is that which pro- 
ceeds by observation and experiment. In this way alone 
can a true psychology be attained. There are not 
two methods; there is only one — the physiologico- 
psychological, or psycho-physical. 

This criticism is not without justice, so far as those 
thinkers are concerned, who, like Hegel and some of the 
Hegelians, first construct a metaphysical system, and 
from it deduce a psychology. This is, indeed, a false 
method of procedure. Psychology must begin with the 
observation of subjective phenomena, and by induction 
arrive at its generalizations ; but this is not the sense in 
which the censure is passed. The charge is that the old 
psychologists no sooner begin, by observing mental facts, 
than they proceed to speculate metaphysically, and to 
strive after metaphysical conclusions by the process of 
inference. 

There is, it may be, a tendency on the part of some 
psychologists to hasten unduly to the adoption of meta- 
physical inferences, but where this is the case the fault 
is not in psychology itself, but in those who profess to 
employ its methods. The disposition, moreover, to run 
into this vicious procedure is not peculiar to psycholo- 
gists. Every science has cultivators who are satisfied 



468 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

with an insufficient induction of facts, and treat unveri- 
fied hypotheses as established theories ; and it would be 
just as fair to charge the physical sciences with inherent 
defectiveness of method because of this fault of some 
scientists, as to censure the old physchology on account 
of the undue precipitancy of some psychologists in 
forming their general conclusions. 

All this, however, supposes the legitimacy of adopting 
metaphysical conclusions derived from a competent ob- 
servation of psychical facts; but the gravamen of the 
charge under consideration is that the psychologist has 
no right to deal with metaphysics at all, and that his 
introduction of it into his methods is to vitiate psychol- 
ogy itself, and destroy its claim to be considered a 
science in any proper sense. Now, none but a positivist 
of the strict Comptist school can consistently take this 
ground. Pie limits the province of science to phenom- 
ena. If he generalizes, the result is a mere collection 
of phenomena. If he arrives at unity — and one cannot 
see how he can ever arrive at it where more than one 
phenomenon is concerned — the so-called unity is a mere 
bundle of related phenomena. The thing he reaches is 
simply an assemblage of individual percepts ; but there 
are, if we may credit Mr. Herbert Spencer's statement, 
very few scientific men, who maintain this position, who 
are mere phenomenalists. The great majority affirm 
and act upon the right to infer unphenomenal existence 
from phenomenal facts ; and so far as appears, this is 
not only legitimate, but necessary. What scientific man 
is there who does not assert the existence of force ? But 
what scientific man is there who could justly claim that 



"Physiological Psychology/'' 469 

force is phenomenal, in itself considered, apart from its 
manifestations ? Who would say that gravity, or any 
other physical force, is observed by sense-perception? 
Here, then, at the boundary of the phenomenal sphere 
every science touches the metaphysical; and to say 
that psychology, the science which does not primarily 
employ sense-perception, but chiefly relies upon the con- 
sciousness of mental phenomena, is the only one which 
has no right to conclude to the unphenomenal, the meta- 
physical, is to talk absurdly. Let the positivist, if he 
please, gather up his phenomena and ligate them with 
some phenomenal bond, much as one ties together a 
bundle of sticks with a piece of twine, and let him, if he 
will, call that a unity, no other scientific man, much less 
the psychologist, will be satisfied with his method. The 
psychologist, notwithstanding the opprobrium of being 
characterized as a fossil, will continue to collect the 
subjective phenomena of thinking, feeling and willing 
upon an unphenomenal substance which thinks, feels 
and wills. Call this metaphysics, and decry it, if one 
chooses, but it is the necessary progress of the human 
reason. Man is one. He cannot disintegrate himself. 
He who notes facts is impelled to go on and search for 
their origins, their ends, their unity. He may, by an 
effort of will, restrain himself to mere observation and 
registration ; but if this be all which is entitled to the 
appellation of science, there are few, if any, sciences. It 
is curious that M. Ribot, who urges this indictment of 
being metaphysical against the old psychology, refers 
with approval to the opinion of Herbart, that "it is 
perhaps a necessity inherent in all psychology, even the 



470 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

experimental, to set out [ !] with some metaphysical 
hypothesis." * 

III. It remains, in accordance with the scheme of the 
discussion, to consider the ultimate ground upon which 
it is claimed that what have been usually regarded as 
the two different, but related, sciences of physiology and 
psychology may be reduced to unity as one and the same 
science — to-wit, that the mind and the body are, in the 
last analysis, not two different, although related, entities, 
but one and the same entity. 

There are some who, like Herbart, are spiritualists, 
maintaining that the soul is a simple, spiritual essence 
distinct from the bodily organism, but are, at the same 
time, associationalists in their psychology. Most, how- 
ever, of the associationalist school of the present day 
hold to the unity of the soul and the body. They con- 
tend that they are one and the same entity. These 
again are subdivided into two classes — first, those who, 
like M. Ribot, cannot be reckoned as substantialists, and 
hold that the one entity is a phenomenon. They may 
be denominated phenomenalists or cerebralists. Sec- 
ondly, there are others who, like Professor Bain, profess 
to admit that the one entity is a substance, but a sub- 
stance which" is alike mental and physical — in the words 
of Dr. Bain, "a double-faced unity." All of these 
thinkers are characterized by a common feature: they 
agree in maintaining the doctrine of the associationalist 
school, that all knowledge originates in sense-experience, 
and is developed from the materials furnished by it, in 
accordance with the law of association. 
1 Germ. Psychol., etc., p. 45. 



"Physiological Psychology/'' 471 

1. I propose, therefore, without going into an elabor- 
ate discussion of that doctrine, to make some remarks 
upon it, inasmuch as it favors the view of the unity of 
the soul and the body, and consequently of psychology 
and physiology. 

(1.) The consideration must be pressed, that, as water 

cannot rise higher than its source, so, according to the 

theory before us, no knowledge, no principles, of the 

human being can transcend the sense-experience in 

which it is claimed that they originate. Dr. Dabney, in 

his able work on The Sensualistic Philosophy in the 

Nineteenth Century, makes, upon this point, remarks 

which challenge attention: 

"Bishop Butler grounded his immortal argument for the spir- 
ituality of that which thinks in us, partly upon the fact that the 
mind not only performed acts of sense-perception through its 
material organs, but performed also abstract acts of intelligence, 
such as the conception of general ideas, and of spirit, and God, 
independently of all organs of sense. Materialists now object 
that he was mistaken in his facts; they think they have proved 
by physiological experiments and reasonings (see page 132) that 
no mental act takes place, not even the most abstract, independent 
of molecular brain-action. And this asserted fact is advanced with 
a triumphant air, as though it destroyed our argument. Turrettin, 
who used the same argument with that just cited from Butler's 
Analogy, two hundred years ago, has acutely anticipated and ex- 
ploded this objection. Suppose it be granted that a molecular 
brain-action does accompany the mind's action in thinking an 
abstract thought, as that of God, spirit, self; can a nerve organ 
give the mind that purely spiritual idea? No cause can give 
what it has not. How is it possible for an organ essentially 
material to give a result from which the material is absolutely 
abstracted? A liver can secrete bile from blood; but the bile is 
as truly a material liquid as the blood. Hence we confirm the 
testimony of our own consciousness that, in abstract thought, as 
in spontaneous volition, the causative action is from the mind 



472 Discussion's of Philosophical Questions. 

towards the nerve organ. The excitement of the nerve-matter is 
consequence, and the spirit's spontaneity is cause. In objective 
perception, the cognition of the new sense-idea in the conscious- 
ness follows the excitement of the nerve-matter, in the order of 
causation. And just so surely, in the case of spontaneous thought, 
feeling, and volition, mental action precedes the action of the 
nerve-matter (if there is any) in the order of causation. So that 
in the sense of Turrettin and Bishop Butler, these acts of soul are 
independent of material actions still; and the inference holds as 
to the soul's distinct existence." 1 

Against this reasoning sundry difficulties may be 
suggested. First, it may be asked, whether effects must 
exist potentially in causes ; whether effects must be like 
their causes. Secondly, it may be urged as an argumen- 
tum ad hominem against the spiritualist that he holds 
God to be a spirit, and yet admits that he is the cause of 
matter which is wholly unlike himself. Thirdly, it may 
be said that the spiritualist contends that the mind is 
spirit, and yet allows that it operates upon matter and 
produces material effects. Why may not matter operate 
upon spirit and produce spiritual effects ? Fourthly, 
the ground may be taken that the first cause in a series 
may start into operation causes which are not like itself, 
the first being simply the condition upon which the other 
causes are brought into independent activity; and, if 
so, sense-perceptions may be merely the conditions upon 
which abstract and general notions may be formed. 

First. The first and the fourth of these difficulties 
may be discharged by the reply that it is incompetent to 
the associationalist to raise them, for the reason that he 
acknowledges the maxim: "Like causes, like effects." 
It is incumbent upon him to show how, in accordance 
^p. 161, 162. 



''Physiological Psychology." 473 

with that maxim sense-perception can be a cause of 
abstract notions and beliefs in transcendental reality. 
The argument of Turrettin, Butler and Dabney holds 
against him on his own ground. 

Secondly. The second difficulty, as addressed to the 
concessions of the spiritualist, he is bound to meet. His 
answer is that God is a creative, and therefore, an 
almighty cause. He is also a free cause. He is not held 
to be a cause operating in virtue of a blind, immanent 
necessity. If he could not create existences, which are 
not identical with himself, or unlike himself, he would 
not be omnipotent and free ; and that would be contrary 
to the supposition that he is God. The analogy does not 
hold between him and us as finite, which is used against 
the spiritualist. 

Thirdly. The third difficulty is one which does not 
bear upon the position of the spiritualist, but does bear 
with peculiar force upon that of the associationalist. 
The latter contends that the materials out of which 
abstract notions, beliefs in space, duration, cause, self, 
and God, and moral convictions and religious sentiments 
are constructed are furnished and only furnished by 
sense-perception. Upon his principle, that like causes 
are followed by like effects, it behooves him to hold and 
to show that there is an analogy between these notions, 
beliefs, convictions and sentiments, on the one hand, 
and the percepts derived from sense on the other. It 
will not do for him to say that they merely precede and 
succeed each other in a uniform manner. He must 
point out the resemblance between them. On his theory, 
the very stuff which is the basis of all mental concepts, 



474 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

beliefs, convictions, the highest as well as the lowest, is 
supplied by sense-experience. This he must show, or 
break down in the development and application of his 
fundamental ]aw. That he is unable to show this will be 
evinced as the argument proceeds. 

The spiritualist is not pressed by this difficulty. True 
he concedes that there is interaction between the mind 
and the nervous system, especially the brain ; and, fur- 
ther, that this interaction is in a certain sense causal; 
but it is with him an important question, what sort of 
causal influence is involved in this interaction. Upon 
that question it is sufficient to say that the causal rela- 
tion is not one which necessarily supposes that the 
nature of the cause is infused, is transmitted, into the 
effect. It is a causa sine qua non. A given sensation 
causes a corresponding perception, in the sense that it 
so conditions the perception that without it the percep- 
tion would not take place, but it would be illegitimate 
to contend that feeling enters into the nature of the 
cognitive act. So when a perception induces a certain 
sensation, it would be equally unwarrantable to hold 
that the cognition forms an element of the feeling. ISTo 
proof can be produced in favor of the position that the 
nervous influences terminating upon the brain constitute 
elements of mental acts. The psychical changes which 
follow them cannot be proved to be so related to the 
molecular agitations of the brain that the former are 
constituted of the latter. It cannot be shown that there 
is an actual transmission into the psychical acts of the 
influence of the cerebral motions. All that can be proved 
is that the one class of activities conditions the other. 



"Physiological Psychology/' 475 

Science will have to go much farther than it has reached 
as yet to prove that brain-motions are of the same 
nature with mental acts. 

But whatever may be thought of the conclusiveness of 
this argument touching the causal relation of sense- 
perceptions to the higher mental products, it is clear 
that, as water cannot rise higher than its source, no 
results of sense-perception can, in their nature, trans- 
cend the nature of sense-perception, the associationalist 
himself being judge. Sensation conduces to perception. 
Perception is the first, the lowest, stage of cognition. 
Percepts, therefore, are fundamental in the development 
of knowledge. The difficulty being now passed by, 
which just here lies across the path of the associational- 
ist — namely, of showing that there is a likeness between 
percepts and sensations, in accordance with the prin- 
ciple : like causes, like effects — it must be admitted that 
imagination and conception which presuppose percepts 
as the very materials upon which they proceed cannot 
overpass them. The former combines them into new 
ideal wholes, and the latter classifies them in accordance 
with thought-relations. Locke's reflection cannot be 
invoked, since it does nothing more than is accomplished 
by imagination and conception; unless it be conceded 
that reflection supposes and employs a priori powers of 
the mind, and then the question would be given up by 
the associationalist. Percepts being the materials with 
which the building up of knowledge proceeds, it is evi- 
dent that the whole edifice, to the topmost point of its 
spire, is composed of percepts. They are combined, 
arranged, classified, but they are percepts still. No 



476 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

imagination, no conception, no reflection, can get higher 
than the percept ; and, since the associationalist limits 
perception to sense-experience, they cannot get higher 
than the sense-percept. How, then, can we account for 
such apprehensions as those of space, duration, the 
infinite, and the like? Will it be contended that they 
are constructed, by virtue of the law of association, out 
of the materials supplied by sense-perception? If so, 
how ? This leads us to the next consideration. 

(2.) The view has here been maintained that, upon 
the principle of the associationalist school that all our 
knowledge originates in sense-experience, and is devel- 
oped from it, none of our knowledge can transcend 
perception ; but it is the common belief of mankind and 
the doctrine of well-nigh all philosophers that our appre- 
hensions of infinite space and duration do transcend 
perception. Now, if they do, some other source must 
be assigned them than sense-perception. The question 
then occurs, How do these sensualistic empiricists ex- 
plain the genesis of what are commonly denominated 
the "abstract notions' 7 involving an infinite element ? 

As to "abstract space" several explanations have been 
given. a Locke would have us infer the notion from the 
comparison -of two bodies seen separated in space. 
James Mill and his followers would derive it from a 
'muscular sense,' recognizing the absence of resistance, 
so that space is but our sense-perception of the extended 
not resisting. Dr. Thomas Brown would resolve it into 
a form of our notion of succession, given us by the 
'muscular sense,' during the progressive contraction of 
some set of muscles." Dr. Dabney, from whose Sensual- 



"Physiological Psychology/' 477 

istic Philosophy 1 this statement of theories has been 
taken, proceeds to pass upon them the following criti- 
cisms : 

"All the plans have this common vice, that the notion of ab- 
stract space has to be assumed at the beginning, in order to carry 
on the genesis of it. Thus, when Locke compared two bodies as 
separated, he must have had the notion of space already in his 
mind, in order to represent to himself the word 'separated.' This 
is too plain for dispute. It is as impossible for the mind to con- 
ceive a body, without positing it in space, as it is to conceive an 
attribute without referring it to a being or entity. Our abstract 
notion of space is the mental locus, which must be given by the 
mind itself, in order to think the idea of body. Nor does the intro- 
duction of a 'muscular sense' help the matter. According to its 
own advocates and patrons, such a sense simply perceives resist- 
ance. It could never give us, then, a direct perception of exten- 
sion. On this scheme, just as much as any other, the latter notion 
must be furnished by the reason, and it must be in order to the 
mind's construing its abstract idea of extension empty of resist- 
ance. Were Dr. Thomas Brown's method valid, it would but 
resolve the notion of space into another form of our notion of suc- 
cessive time, and this we shall show to be underived." 

These strictures are true, but it is proposed in these 

remarks to pursue a somewhat different line of argument 

— namely, to show the impossibility of arriving at the 

infinite by the road of sense-perception. Let us hear 

M. Ribot, as he expounds the method by which this 

impossibility is overcome. He is stating the respective 

positions of the two schools of a priori and a posteriori 

psychology : 

"Let us define the difference between the two schools of psy- 
chology by an example. The transcendentalists examine our ideas 
of space and time; they find that each contains in itself in an 
indissoluble manner the idea of the infinite. Naturally we have no 

x Pp. 251, 252. 



478 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

experimental knowledge of the infinite ; all our ideas derived from 
experience are ideas of finite things. Nevertheless, it is impossible 
to conceive of time and space otherwise than as infinite, and it is 
impossible to derive them from experience ; these are the necessary- 
conceptions of the mind. The a posteriori psychologist, on his 
side, sees clearly that we cannot think of time and space otherwise 
than as infinite, but he does not consider them as an ultimate 
fact. He sees in it an ordinary manifestation of one of the laws 
of the association of ideas — the law that the idea of a thing irre- 
sistibly suggests the idea of another thing with which it has often 
been found by experience to be intimately united. As we have 
never had any experience of a point in space without other points 
beyond it, nor of a point in time without other points which 
follow it, the law of inseparable association causes us to be unable 
to think of any point in time or space, however distant, without 
immediately imagining [N. B.] other points yet more distant. 
This explains their infinitude without introducing 'necessity.' ' 1 

Let it be observed that there is here an unmistakable 
admission of the infinite : "We cannot think of time and 
space otherwise than as infinite." One might stop to 
challenge the accuracy of this language on two accounts : 
first, because time, from the nature of the case, is finite ; 
it can be measured. He ought to have used the term 
duration. Secondly, it is impossible to think infinite 
duration and space; but let that pass. Did M. Ribot, 
like Dr. Bain, deny the infinite, the argument of Dr. 
Dabney would be pertinent, that space and duration, 
even as finite, are not objects of perception. But let us 
grant to M. Ribot, for the sake of argument, that, in 
perceiving related objects and events, we perceive the 
distance, the interval, between them. Let us take the 
instance of space. How stands the case, as he describes 
it ? We perceive the space between two objects related 

1 English Psychology. Trans., pp. 86, 87. 



"Physiological Psychology/' 479 

by association. We also perceive the distance between 
the second object and a third beyond it; and also of a 
fourth beyond the third ; and so on until we reach the 
last object related to the faculty of perception — that is, 
one beyond which we can perceive no other. What then ? 
We imagine an object beyond the last one perceivable, 
and go on to imagine others with the distances between 
them, beyond and still beyond. Thus we reach infini- 
tude, without introducing "necessity." 

E"ow either the infinite is here employed in its strict 
and accepted sense of the illimitable, or it is not. If it 
is not, only the big finite is spoken of, and the whole 
exposition is trivial. If it is, the ground is taken that 
the infinite as the illimitable is attained to by the imagi- 
nation, through the addition of limited sections of space 
to limited sections of space. As every one of these sec- 
tions is confessedly limited, lying as they do between 
imagined "points" which bound it, the whole series of 
sections must be limited, in accordance with the impreg- 
nable maxim that what is predicable of all the parts is 
predicable of the whole. Consequently, the whole is 
limited, or, what is the same thing, finite. ~Ro imagined 
addition of finite to finite can give the infinite ; but, if 
the imagination — the power appealed to — cannot reach 
the infinite, it is unsupposable that any other power 
proceeding a posteriori can reach it. We are shut up to 
the conclusion that as we do certainly have an apprehen- 
sion of the infinite, and the imagination cannot furnish 
it, that apprehension must be assigned to an a priori 
source. This "explanation" of the experimental method 
by which we get the infinite palpably breaks down, and 



480 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

as it is not likely that any other, pursuing the same 
road, will be more successful, we are entitled to rest in 
the conviction that all our knowledge is not derived from 
sense-experience. 

Further, it has, in these remarks, been contended that 
if all our knowledge originates in sense-perception, no 
knowledge can rise higher than the sense-percept. It 
may be urged, on the contrary, that the imagination 
transcends perception. There is a sense in which this 
is true, as has already been conceded. The imagination 
has the power of combining, arranging, classifying the 
materials with which it deals ; but what are these ma- 
terials ? They are percepts, represented by the imagi- 
nation. Combine, arrange, and classify, subtract, add, 
and multiply, as it may, the material of all these pro- 
cesses is percepts. It is often remarked that the imagi- 
nation is a creative power — as in the case of the poet, 
for example. The language is figurative. It certainly 
is not true that the imagination creates something from 
nothing. What, then, does it create? The answer is, 
new and often surprising wholes, but these wholes are 
but the aggregates of previously existing materials. 
They may exist in the form of concepts, and the philo- 
sophic genius may combine them into a system, which, 
as such, had no previous existence ; but concepts are but 
percepts as thought under the forms of the logical under- 
standing. Concepts of concepts — second intentions, in 
the language of the schoolmen — cannot transcend the 
particular materials furnished by perception, or, what 
is the same, by consciousness. The imagination of the 
astronomer, in its attempt to compass the universe, but 



"Physiological Psychology/' 481 

uses the intervals between perceived stars. Add them 
together, multiply them, as he may, and he will inevi- 
tably be baffled in his endeavor to imagine space which 
is not inter-stellar. He can never escape from the 
imagination of limits. All this would be true were the 
nisus of the imagination to proceed in only a single 
direction — that of length ; but the difficulty is immeas- 
urably enhanced when it attempts to radiate from a 
centre outwards in every direction to compass the 
infinite spherically. What can it accomplish in its 
utmost flights ? Only the image of a firmament that is 
all-enclosing; but if that were reached, only the finite 
would be attained; for what is enclosed is bounded; 
and yet beyond that all-enclosing firmament of the 
imagination, beyond which it cannot go, we are com- 
pelled to believe that there is space which no firmament 
embraces. What is that belief — what can it be but the 
offspring of an a priori "necessity" ? Let any one try 
the experimental method in his attempt to reach infinite 
space, and, if he is not willing to deny his consciousness, 
he will confess the utter inadequacy of that method. 
The apprehension of the infinite transcends sense- 
perception in its highest results, as used by conception 
and the imagination. It cannot, therefore, originate 
in it. 

But if, as Dr. Dabney argues, the space between 
"points" or objects is unperceivable, if the terminating 
objects as phenomenal are all that is perceived, and the 
space between them as unphenomenal is not perceived, 
the bottom drops out of the theory. There would be no 
sense-perceptions to start with in the architectonic enter- 
prise of building up the idea of infinite space. 



482 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

In the following utterance I understand Professor 
Bain, whom John Stuart Mill, in an article in the Edin- 
burgh Review, claimed as belonging essentially to the 
association school," to deny the existence of the infinite 
in denying the possibility of conceiving infinite space: 

"The only real notion that we can ever form of extension, as 
empty space, is a sweep ( ! ) between two resistances ; infinite 
space, where the points, or termini, of resistance are done away 
with, is therefore an incompetent, irrelevant, impossible concep- 
tion; it does not comply with the conditions indispensable to the 
notion." 1 

One must be indulged in a few comments upon this 
position : 

In the first place, as Professor Bain acknowledges no 
power in belief or faith to give us knowledge transcend- 
ing that furnished by conception, in denying the possi- 
bility of conceiving infinite space, he denies the possi- 
bility of apprehending it. For the same reason he is 
bound to deny the possibility of apprehending anything 
infinite. It is inconceivable, and, therefore, beyond the 
reach of the human faculties. As all termini are done 
away with on the supposition of infinite space, there is 
no possibility of measuring it, and consequently no 
chance of building up the notion of its infinity. There- 
fore, away with it! The school of sense-experience 
cannot tolerate it; and so, as there are no stadia by 
which we can measure anything infinite, there is no 
possibility of constructing the notion of it. The so- 
called infinite must go. It is, in the words of Mr. J. S. 
Mill, a "nonsensical abstraction." 

1 Mental Science, pp. 48, 49. 



"Physiological Psychology/'' 483 

In the second place, the doctors of the associationalist 
school differ. We have heard M. Ribot asserting the 
infinite, and attempting to show how the apprehension 
is reached npon the principles of that school. Dr. Bain 
proves that upon those principles it cannot be reached. 
Dr. Bain certainly has the advantage of the argument. 
We cannot reach the infinite by the method of sense- 
experience. The doing away with termini of measure- 
ment is the doing away with the infinite ; but — 

In the third place, this explodes the associationalist 
school. In attempting to disprove the infinite it destroys 
itself. It has been shown that the effort to reach the 
infinite by the road of sense-perception is vain; and 
Dr. Bain virtually confesses this in denying infinite 
space. A school which is either unable to account for 
the apprehension of the infinite, or boldly denies it, 
cannot live. John Stuart Mill himself admits that if 
we endeavor to assign limits to space, we are compelled 
to believe that there is space beyond those limits ; and, 
as Samuel Clarke shows, if we suppose that beyond 
those limits there is nothing, we are obliged to believe 
that that nothing is space. 

I had purposed to subject to special examination Pro- 
fessor Bain's objections to "the doctrine of innate ideas 
and principles," * but their detailed discussion would 
protract this discussion to an undue length; nor is it 
necessary. They may be easily refuted by the applica- 
tion to them of the single law of belief in the infinite. 
For example, under the head of his first objection, and as 
an instance sustaining it, he cites space, and asks, with 

1 Mental Science, p. 182 ff. 



484 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

reference to his "analysis of space" (!), whether it is 
not sufficient, and if not, demands to be informed what 
element there is "that cannot be identified with muscular 
feeling and sensation, under the intellectual properties 
of difference, agreement and retentiveness." The ready 
answer is, its infinity. So, under his second objection, 
he says : "The unquestionable rule being that our know- 
ledge is gained through movement and sense (intellec- 
tual functions cooperating), the burden lies with the 
advocate of innate truth to make good any exceptions to 
this rule." The reply is, infinite space and infinite 
duration are exceptions to this "unquestionable rule." 

His third objection is : "On the theory of nominalism, 
innate general ideas would involve innate particulars." 
This he enforces by the remark, "If an abstraction, or 
generality, be nothing but a host of particulars identified 
and compared, the abstraction is nothing without the 
particulars." The answer is, on no theory do the ab- 
stractions or generalities of infinite space and infinite 
duration involve particulars. They are characterized 
by absolute simplicity. 

So one might go on through all six of his objections, 
but these examples must suffice. Dr. Bain observes that 
"in the present position of the controversy in question, 
the chief alleged innate (speculative) principles are the 
axioms of mathematics, and the law of causation." He 
" forgets God " — the consummate end of all human 
inquiry. Even Mr. John Stuart- Mill not unfrequently 
condescends to speak of the deity as at least a possibility, 
but one is struck by the conspicuous absence from Dr. 
Bain's book on Mental Science of allusions to the exist- 



"Physiological Psychology/' 485 

ence of such a being. This, however, is eminently 
consistent. A psychology without a sonl is the correla- 
tive of a philosophy without a God. This is science, and 
as science has to do only with facts, and God is not a 
fact, the scientific man can have nothing to do with God ! 
What if it should turn out that God will have something 
to do with him ? 

The conclusion to which we come is that the infinite 
will not down at the bidding of the associationalist, and 
the associationalist cannot get up to the infinite. His 
theory is infinitely a failure. 

There are other arguments against this doctrine 
which, were I writing a volume on this particular sub- 
ject, would need to be developed. Their consideration 
must here be foregone, and, really, enough has been 
said, if it has been shown that, in the instance of the ap- 
prehension of the infinite, as applicable to space, to du- 
ration, to God, the theory breaks down. Falsus in uno, 
falsus in omnibus. It is false in principle. 

2. A previous analysis conducted us to a definite 
issue, the further consideration of which was deferred 
for a time. I come now to some notice of that issue. It 
is, whether the brain and the so-called mind are one and 
the same. It is tantamount to — at least, in the last 
analysis, it involves — the old question between the spir- 
itualist and the materialist ; but the issue is presented in 
a new form. There is the refusal to admit that either 
the so-called mind or the so-called body is a substance — 
a substratum or support of qualities which constitutes 
their bond of unity ; and the assumption that the mind 
and the brain come together in one and the same entity, 



486 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

which is neither spiritual nor material, but is simply 
mental and physical at one and the same time. We 
have, then, the hypothesis of a psycho-physical entity or 
something, which is neither substantively material nor 
substantively immaterial, nor both. This something is 
what M. Eibot calls "one phenomenon of a double face," 
and Dr. Bain "a double-faced unity." 

(1.) We have seen that M. Kibot rejects and ridicules 
the hypothesis of two substances, and substitutes for it 
that of "two phenomena which have, for each particular 
case, so constant a connection that they can be most 
exactly designated as one phenomenon of a double face." 

(2.) With this hypothesis of M. Eibot that of Dr. 
Bain, although expressed differently, is in real agree- 
ment. He denominates so-called mind the subject, and 
so-called matter the object. The defining characteristic 
of mind as the subject is the absence of extension. 
Mind, then, is unextended. The defining characteristic 
of matter, the object, is extension. Matter, of course, 
is phenomenal, since he holds its essence to be inertia. 
Is mind also phenomenal ? Let us hear Dr. Bain : "The 
only account of mind strictly admissible in scientific 
psychology consists in specifying three properties or 
functions — feeling, will or volition, and thought or in- 
tellect — through which all our experience, as well objec- 
tive as subjective, is built up." 1 That these "properties 
or functions" are phenomenal will be made to appear 
from what he says as to substance. Discarding an occult 
substate of matter, he makes its essence to be inertia. 
Likewise, rejecting an occult substance of mind — the 
1 Mental Science, pp. 1, 2. 



"Physiological Psychology/'' 487 

view of the substantialists — he says: "According to 
the other view, the substance of mind is the three funda- 
mental and defining attributes ; those powers or func- 
tions which, being present, constitute mind, and in 
whose absence we do not apply the name. They are 
feeling, volition, and intellect." 1 That this is his own 
view is evident from its correspondence with his defini- 
tions just specified. !Now either the mind is, in the last 
analysis, substantive or phenomenal. Since Dr. Bain 
holds that it is not substantive, he must hold that it is 
phenomenal. That there may be a thing which is 
neither substantive nor phenomenal is, so far as I know, 
maintained by none. That Dr. Bain's hypothesis is 
really coincident with M. Ribot's is, therefore, apparent. 
It is true that he employs the word substance, but, as has 
been evinced, in a sense entirely different from that of 
the substantialists. 

In addition to what has alreadv been urged in the 
criticism of this extraordinary hypothesis, a few consid- 
erations will be subjoined. 

First. All the arguments may be advanced against it 
which, in the controversy with the materialist, are drawn 
from the impossibility of bringing utterly incompatible 
attributes into unity upon one and the same thing. 
Especially is this sort of argument possessed of an ad 
hominem force as addressed to the express concessions 
of Dr. Bain. He defines mind as unextended, and mat- 
ter as extended. His unit is, therefore, both unextended 
and extended. There is no extension in one of its faces, 
and plenty of it in the other. His metaphor of a 
1 Mental Science, p. 99. 



488 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

"double-faced unity" is, to say the least of it, infelici- 
tous. What a phenomenal face lacking extension can 
mean, and how it is connected with a face as extended 
as the brain in the same phenomenon, it is hard to con- 
jecture; but, not to press the figure, an unextended- 
extended phenomenal thing — what, in the name of 
imagination or belief, can it be ? 

Secondly. These writers fail to represent the human 
being as a unit. In their last analysis, human nature is 
a compound. Take M. Kibot's bold account of the case. 
Two phenomena are brought into so constant a connec- 
tion that they can be most exactly designated as one 
phenomenon. In the first place, one craves to know 
how it is possible for two phenomenal things to be one 
phenomenal thing. These writers are men of science 
and view the matter from a scientific point, To what 
analogy of a scientific character can they appeal ? To 
chemical affinity? Would they say, for instance, that 
the combination of hydrogen and oxygen can be exactly 
designated as one phenomenon ? Is water a unit ? Can 
it not be decomposed into hydrogen and oxygen again ? 
Strictly speaking, where is the unity of water? and, 
strictly speaking, where is the unity of each of the con- 
stituents ? Is it not said that hydrogen, for example, 
which is assumed as the unit of atomic weight, is itself 
diatomic ? and yet we are told that mind and body are 
a single phenomenon ! This is simply reckless assertion. 
In the second place, there is not merely the combination 
of one phenomenon with another phenomenon to con- 
stitute a third phenomenon, which is the unity with a 
double face, but there are sets of mental phenomena, 



"Physiological Psychology."" 489 

and sets of physical phenomena, which themselves need 
to be reduced to unity before this marvellous double- 
faced unity can be constituted out of them. What a 
short-hand method of unification is this of M. Ribot! 
In the third place, even the atomic components, of which 
the ultimate chemical elements are said to consist, are 
unphenomenal. Who has ever perceived an atom ? The 
very basis is lacking of this pretended association of 
phenomena. It is as impossible to get a phenomenal 
foundation for it as it is to fabricate a phenomenal unit 
from it. This is true on the physical side alone; how 
much more apparent is the impossibility on the mental ! 
Let us see whether it fares better with Dr. Bain's 
statement of the case. He appears to perceive the 
necessity of first separately reducing to unity each of 
the sets of phenomena before he reaches the ultimate 
unity of the sets themselves in his psycho-physical, 
double-faced entity. Distinguishing, as to matter, "be- 
tween the fundamental, constant, inerasible attributes, 
and those that are variable, fluctuating, or separable," 
he says, "Thus, as regards 'matter/ the property 'iner- 
tia' is fundamental and irremovable." Further, "The 
substance of body, or matter generally, would thus be 
what is common to all body — inertia." 1 Xow we have 
seen that in his opening chapter, on Definitions, he 
makes matter and the object, or object-world, the same, 
and remarks, "The department of the object, or object- 
world, is exactly circumscribed by one property, exten- 
sion." Two things only will be said of this account of 
the unification of matter. In the first place, unless Dr. 
1 Mental Science, Appendix, pp. 98, 99. 



490 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

Bain can show the identity of extension and inertia, he 
uses contradictory affirmations, and it would task his 
powers to evince that identity. In the second place, this 
fundamental and unifying something is expressly called 
"an attribute," "a property" ; but if it be, it is obviously 
not ultimate. It must be an attribute, a property of 
something, or the words are employed abusively. Yet 
this thing is the unity to which so-called matter is 
reduced. But leaving Dr. Bain's matter as substantially 
immaterial, let us consider briefly his unification of 
mind. 

The unity of mind consists in "the three fundamental 
and defining attributes" — the "powers or functions" of 
"feeling, volition, and intellect." It is in the conjunc- 
tion of these three that unity must be sought. Now — 

In the first place, attributes suppose something to 
which they belong. Attributes of what ? If of nothing, 
contradiction emerges. If of something common to the 
attributes themselves, absurdity obtains. 

In the second place, powers and functions are treated 
as the same; but functions are the results of powers. 
Granted, however, that they are the same, what exercises 
the powers — discharges the functions ? If nothing, the 
words are unmeaning. If something belonging to the 
powers or functions themselves, the affirmation is ab- 
surd. 

In the third place, Dr. Bain does not tell us — could 
he? — what that something is which reduces to unity 
feeling, volition, and thought. According to him, it 
must be an element in which they are "conjoined," a 
generic something which is at one and the same time 



"Physiological Psychology/'' 491 

feeling, volition and thought, without being either spe- 
cifically. As he denies a feeling, willing, thinking sub- 
stance, one may safely challenge Dr. Bain to point out 
what the unit is which feels, wills, and thinks. 

In the fourth place, if another alternative mentioned 
by Dr. Bain be considered, the result is no better. It is 
"to call the total of any concrete the substance, and each 
one of its properties, mentioned singly, a quality, or 
attribute." But as substance, properly speaking, is dis- 
carded, the total of a concrete is simply a collection of 
phenomena, and it amounts to this : the phenomena are 
phenomena of a collection of themselves ! 

It is sufficient for the refutation of these wretched 
attempts of associationalists to unify the powers of the 
human mind to cite the opinion of John Stuart Mill — 
and their school has produced no more powerful thinker 
— that there is a bond which organically unites all our 
consciousnesses, 

" I hold it to be indubitable," he observes, "that there is some- 
thing real in this bond, real as the sensations themselves; and 
which is not simply a product of the laws of thought without any- 
thing which corresponds to it. That original element 
which has no community of nature with anything answering to 
our names, and to which we can give no other name than its own 
without implying some false or unsteady theory, is the ego." x 

If, then, these writers are logically obliged to admit, 
instead of two phenomenal faces, a multitude of such 
faces, and utterly fail to indicate the unit to which these 
faces are attached, their hypothesis of a double-faced 
unity hopelessly breaks down. 

This discussion must here be arrested, and I must 

1 Quoted by Eibot, Eng. Psychol., p. 122. 



492 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

express the conviction that the arguments of the monistic 
physiological psychologists add no force to those of the 
out-and-out materialist, I have endeavored to refute the 
reasoning of the former, rather than to furnish positive 
proofs of the separate existence of the soul. Such proofs 
have been abundantly supplied in the protracted contro- 
versy with the materialists ; but in relation to the com- 
paratively recent questions raised by the school of sensu- 
alistic associationalism touching what they denominate 
physiological psychology, I would make special refer^ 
ence to the very able arguments of Dr. R. L. Dabney in 
his Sensualistic Philosophy, and of Prof. G. T. Ladd, in 
the latter part of his Physiological Psychology. 

I desire, in this connection, to place on record two 
cases bearing upon this question of the difference be- 
tween the soul and the body, which fell under my per- 
sonal observation, and exercised an influence upon my 
thinking concerning the subject. 

The first is that of Capt. Kinsey Burden King, an 
intelligent planter, of St. Paul's Parish, Colleton 
County, South Carolina. I had been studying afresh 
Bishop Butler's argument in favor of a future life, and 
had come to the conclusion that the presumption created 
by the fact that the mind often increases in vigor in 
proportion to the decay of the body was too uncertain 
to be relied upon, even as a probable proof. That is 
true in certain diseases, pulmonary, for example; but 
the opposite seems true when the brain is paralyzed. 
While in that mental attitude towards the Bishop's argu- 
ment, I was one night called up to see my friend, who 



"Physiological Psychology/'' 493 

was dying. I found hira lying in a perfectly comatose 
condition, as motionless as a corpse, with his large, black 
eyes fixed, with an unwinking gaze, in a certain direc- 
tion upon the ceiling. The physician was endeavoring, 
with loud calls to him, and a spoon of calomel pressed to 
his lips, to get him to take the medicine. Failing in his 
effort, he turned away and said, "Mrs. King, I am sorry 
that I can do no more for him." 

Some one then suggested to her to speak to him. Put- 
ting her mouth near his ear she said to him, in little 
more than an ordinary tone, "My dear, wouldn't you 
like to see Bunner ?" (a pet name for their little boy). 
What a transformation that question effected ! Putting 
his elbow behind him, the almost lifeless man raised 
himself and sat up in bed, asking, "Where is he V 3 The 
little fellow, who was sleeping in another room across a 
passage, was brought to him. Leaning forward, he took 
the child in his arms, called him his darling, and kissed 
him repeatedly. The scene was thrilling, and the room 
was filled with the weeping of the friends who were 
present. Standing at the foot of the bed, and moved 
to tears, I was saying to myself, "Old Bishop, I believe 
you were right. Here is a dark lantern. Just now I 
saw no light. Xow the door is thrown open, and the 
brilliant light is pouring out its rays." The dying man 
then sank back with the child clasped to him in his left 
arm, and relapsed into his former comatose and motion- 
less condition. ''Look!" thought I, "the door of the 
lantern is closed, but the bright lamp within is burning 
as brilliantly as it did a few moments ago. The thick 
walls of clav have shut it in. It cannot shine through 



494 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

them, but it is there shining all the same. Old Bishop, I 
believe you were right." Very soon after, my friend 
died. Still a lingering doubt remained. May not the 
question have shocked the nervous system into temporary 
action % There was no spontaneous mental action. That 
doubt was removed by the other case. 

It was that of the Rev. Robert Robertson Small, a 
young preacher of Shreveport, Louisiana, on his way to 
South Carolina to be married. Upon his arrival at the 
home of his parents in Charleston, he was prostrated by 
an attack of typhus fever. He lay ill for a month and 
died. On the last night of his life he lay dying for 
about six hours, during which time his body was motion- 
less, his arms lying alongside of him, and his eye — for 
one looked across the line of vision of the other — fixed, 
as in Captain King's case, with steady, unwinking gaze, 
apparently at a certain point of the ceiling. There was 
no sign of life, save a slight breathing, which gradually 
became fainter and fainter. Towards morning, without 
being touched or spoken to, in the midst of silence which 
reigned in the chamber, a smile played upon his sunken 
features, and, lifting both hands, he stretched them out 
in the direction in which he was seemingly looking. 
The smile faded away, and the arms fell back to their 
former position. After a short interval the same smile 
and the same reaching forth of the hands occurred, suc- 
ceeded by the ITippoeratic face and the motionlessness 
of the arms. Then, the third time, the same thrilling 
signs of mental activity were exhibited; but this time 
the smile became beaming and indicative of inward rap- 
ture, the arms were stretched to their utmost tension, 



" Physiological Psychology/'* 495 

and the lips moved in a whispered utterance. One 
standing near his head leaned down to hear, and reported 
him as having said, "Earth is receding — heaven." The 
light gradually vanished from his face, the corpse-like 
repose was resumed, and shortly afterward he ceased to 
breathe. 

All this I saw with my own eyes. The facts convinced 
me. Aiy speculative doubt was gone. It was clear that 
the soul is capable of existence and activity separately 
from the bodily organism. !N*o afferent nerve had trans- 
mitted a current of influence to the brain ; but the soul 
itself, moved by its anticipation of immortal bliss, had 
stirred the almost dead body to smiles of ecstasy and 
words of hope. 

" "Tis true, 'tis certain ; man, though dead, retains 
Part of himself; th' immortal mind remains." 



SPACE— WHAT IS IT? 



TTT HATE VEE, space may be supposed to be, it is, so 

V V far as I know, very generally admitted to be 
infinite ; and this admission would seem to be demanded 
by necessity, for it is impossible to conceive it as finite. 
"To set bounds to space," says Dr. Samuel Clarke, "is to 
suppose it bounded by something which itself takes up 
space, and that is a contradiction: or else that it is 
bounded by nothing ; and then the idea of that nothing 
will still be space, which is another contradiction." * 

Either it is nothing, or it is something. An infinite 
nothing is impossible; for nothing is a negation of 
which the only affirmation possible is that it is not exist- 
ent; but to say that it is infinite is to make another 
affirmation of it, which is contrary to the definition. An 
infinite nothing is either nonsense, or it is a contradic- 
tion in terms. If it be something, the following sup- 
positions are possible : Either, first, it is a relation ; or, 
secondly, it is a condition ; or, thirdly, it is a substance ; 
or, fourthly, it is an attribute of substance. 

1 . Is space a relation ? If it be, it must either be a 
relation between finite things, or between God and finite 
things. Take the first supposition — that it is a relation 
between finite things. 

1 Answer to the Sixth Letter appended to his "Demonstration," 
etc. This Letter was written by another than Butler, who wrote 
the first five. 



Space — What is It? 497 

In the first place, an infinite relation between finite 
things, if it does not imply a contradiction, is at least 
inconceivable. A finite thing cannot be everywhere; 
neither can two or more finite things. Between these 
finite things, therefore, a relation must be finite. An 
infinite relation must extend everywhere; but to say 
that space is a finite relation contradicts the assumption 
that it is infinite. 

In the second place, a relation implies objects between 
which it exists. These objects are, from the nature of 
the case, the terms of the relation. The relation is, 
therefore, terminal — it terminates on two or more 
things. This necessarily implies that it is bounded, and 
in each particular case by the objects between which it 
exists; but space is admitted to be infinite; and we 
would have, upon the supposition, a limited, or finite, 
infinite, which is a palpable contradiction. 

In the third place, we would have, upon this hypothe- 
sis, as many relations as there are objects between which 
they could exist. Each of these relations would, of 
course, be bounded by its terms, and the double contra- 
diction would emerge, of a number of infinite relations, 
and a number of bounded relations which are one infinite 
relation. 

In the fourth place, we cannot conceive of space as 
thus limited to an existence between terms or bounda- 
ries. We are compelled to conceive it as existing beyond 
as well as between finite objects whatever they may be; 
but that which goes beyond two or more finite objects, 
and infinitely beyond them, cannot be said to be simply 
a relation between them. Let us instance two worlds. 



498 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

Space cannot be conceived as terminating with these 
worlds. It must be conceived as lying infinitely beyond 
them. What is predicable of two is predicable of any 
number of worlds, or systems of worlds. We can con- 
ceive the universe as limitable, but we cannot so con- 
ceive space, as a whole. As a whole, it is conceived as 
having a comprehension greater than the universe ; for 
we are forced to conceive the universe as existing in it. 
Space, therefore, cannot be regarded as astricted to two 
or more points in the universe, even those the most 
remote from each other. It has no terms, and conse- 
quently cannot be simply a relation. 

In the fifth place, against the hypothesis that space is 
only a relation may be urged its incapability of displace- 
ment. It may be admitted that, for purposes of thought, 
we may assign limits, in a certain sense, to it; just as 
we may conceive of the limited exercise even of a divine 
attribute — for example, of power or justice or mercy; 
but we cannot conceive of a divine attribute, as to its 
integrity, being limited. That would be to conceive the 
infinite as finite. So we may conceive of a limited por- 
tion of space, but we cannot conceive of space as an 
infinite whole being limited. Within the limits which 
in thought we may assign to it, be they greater or less, 
we cannot conceive of it as being displaced. It is up to, 
in, through and beyond, any two or more objects. We 
may represent, for purposes of thinking, these walls as 
limiting space, and call it the space within the walls, but 
we cannot avoid conceiving it as in and through the 
walls, and as existing beyond them; but that of which 
these things may be affirmed cannot be defined to be a 



Space — What is It? 499 

mere relation between two or more finite things. Ob- 
jects are related to each other in space, but space is not 
simply a relation between them. So much for the first 
supposition, that space is a relation between finite 
things. 

Let us take the second supposition — that it is a rela- 
tion between God and finite things. Upon this supposi- 
tion one or more of the terms of the relation must be 
regarded as finite. Now as no finite things, multiply 
them as you will, are everywhere, the relation being in 
one direction bounded by them cannot extend to the 
infinitude of God. It is, therefore, not an infinite rela- 
tion. It stops at points within and not up to God's im- 
mensity. There may be relations — there are — between 
an infinite being and finite things, but they are not 
infinite relations. I speak of local relations, for they 
alone are relevant to the argument. An infinite relation 
bounded in one direction by a finite object is inconceiv- 
able. Space, then, as infinite, can be conceived neither 
as a relation between finite things, nor as a relation 
between God and finite things. 

2. Is space a condition ? If it be, it must be consid- 
ered either as a condition of existence or as a condition 
of thought. Is it a condition of existence ? It cannot 
be affirmed to be a condition of God's existence; for if 
that position be intelligible, it is maintained that the 
infinite, and, therefore, unconditioned, Being is condi- 
tioned, and conditioned by something out of himself. 
That would involve two contradictions: first, that an 
unconditioned being is conditioned; secondly, that an 
infinite being is conditioned by an infinite something 



500 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

which is not himself ; that is, that there are two separate 
infinities, one of which conditions the other. 

If, further, it be held that the condition is not out of 
but within the divine being, it may be replied that we 
can make no distinction between conditions and attri- 
butes of the infinite being. It is not competent to us to 
speak of conditions either of the existence or energies 
of God. The language is unintelligible, and the notion 
it professes to symbolize, zero. 

Moreover, if space be a condition of God's existence, 
then either there are said to be two conditions of his 
existence, or space and the necessity of the divine exist- 
ence are affirmed to be one and the same. If there be 
any sense in which it may be said that there is a condi- 
tion of the divine existence — which may well be denied 
— the only one which would appear tolerable is that in 
which necessity is considered such a condition. It has 
been said that his being is conditioned by a necessity 
incomprehensibly inhering in itself. To say that space 
is such a condition is to confound it with the necessity 
of God's existence, which is absurd ; for then it would 
follow that all things exist in the necessity of the divine 
existence. 

Yet again :- if space be a condition of the divine ex- 
istence, then it is either a condition of our apprehension 
of the divine existence, or a condition of that existence 
itself. If the former, as it is an irresistible conviction of 
our minds that all finite things exist in space — a con- 
viction explicitly acknowledged even by Kant — it 
would follow that it is an irresistible conviction 
of our minds that all finite things exist in a condition 



Space — What is It? 501 

of our apprehension of the divine existence; which is 
absurd. If the latter — namely, that space is a condition 
of the divine existence itself — it would follow that, in 
accordance with the same irresistible conviction, all 
finite things exist in a condition of the divine existence ; 
which is also absurd. 

But if space cannot be shown to be a condition of 
God's existence, may it not be merely a condition of 
finite existence ? If it be merely the condition of finite 
existence, say of the existence of the universe, it would 
follow that, as it is admitted that space is infinite, and 
the universe finite, space is where the universe is not ; 
and then it would further follow that there is a condi- 
tion of existence where nothing exists to be conditioned ; 
which is absurd. To this it cannot be objected that the 
same difficulty inheres in the supposition that space is 
an attribute of God's substance — the immensity of an 
infinite Spirit ; for, it being admitted that God exists, 
his attributes must equally exist, whether there be any 
finite existence to be conditioned by them or not. But if 
space be not an attribute of the divine substance, but a 
condition of finite existence, it is, ex hypothesi, simply 
and merely a condition of finite existence, and therefore 
would not itself exist except in relation to such exist- 
ence. So that the supposition is necessitated that the 
existence of the condition is itself conditioned upon the 
existence to which it is related. But an infinite condi- 
tion, having no other reason for its existence than its re- 
lation to finite things, is an absurdity. 

What has been said in regard to the supposition that 
space is a condition of the existence of the universe 



502 Discussions op Philosophical Questions. 

would, of course, hold with greatly increased force of 
the supposition that it is the condition of the existence 
of any particular finite thing. 

Furthermore, if space is affirmed to be merely a condi- 
tion of existence, then either it is nothing or something 
—an ens or a non-ens. If nothing, it is incapable of 
predication, for of nothing nothing can be affirmed or 
denied. Nothing, therefore, cannot be said to be the 
condition of something. If it be replied that this predi- 
cation is possible in regard to it — namely, that existence 
is denied to it — then, as a condition must have some sort 
of existence, it is denied that space can be a condition, 
and that would be to abandon the supposition that, as 
nothing, it is a condition of existence. If, on the other 
hand, space be something, an entity, then it is either a 
rational or real entity — an ens rationis, or an ens reale. 
If the former, as every ens rationis is an element or a 
product of some mind, space, as a condition of existence, 
is either an element or product of a finite mind, or of the 
infinite mind. If of a finite mind, we would have an 
infinite element of a finite thing or an infinite product 
of a finite factor, either of which suppositions is contra- 
dictory and absurd. If of the infinite mind, as every 
ens rationis must be conceived as either an element or a 
product of the reason, space, as a condition of existence, 
is either an element or a product of the divine reason. 
If an element, as no element can be the totality of that 
in which it exists, we have a condition of God's existence 
which does not correspond with the totality of his being ; 
which cannot be admitted. If a product, as every 
product is dependent upon the thing producing it, we 



Space — What is It? 503 

have a dependent existence conditioning the existence 
of that on which it depends ; which is contradictory and 
absurd. 

It must be added that it is unintelligible to affirm that 
an ens rationis conditions the existence of the ratio. 
That which has its ground of existence in the reason 
cannot be said to be a condition of the reason. This 
applies equally to the infinite being and to finite beings. 
The reason, or intelligence, is an element of existence 
in either case ; and, as an ens rationis cannot condition 
one of the elements of an existence, it cannot condition 
that existence as a whole. 

It may, however, be said that a divine ens rationis 
may condition the existence of other beings than God. 
To this I answer that God's ideas, which are real know- 
ledges, cannot be distinguished from his intelligence, 
and to say that the divine intelligence, as conditioning 
finite existence, is space, is to admit that space is an 
attribute of God, and that would be to gainsay the 
hypothesis that space is not an attribute of God, but a 
mere condition of existence, and so to give up the ques- 
tion. So much for the supposition that space, as a 
condition of existence, is an ens rationis — a mere mental 
entity. 

If space, as a condition of existence, be an ens reale — 
a real entity, and is, according to the hypothesis, differ- 
ent from God, we would have two real beings, which are 
co-existing, but independent, infinities; and that in- 
volves a contradiction, for two real infinite beings must 
be supposed to limit and condition each other ; which 
is to deny that either is infinite, since no infinite being 
can be limited and conditioned. 



504 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

To state the case in another form : Either space is a 
subjective or an objective condition of existence. If 
subjective to God, it is a divine property, which is to 
give up the question. If objective to God, we have an 
infinite objective existence conditioning another infinite 
existence, both as subjective and objective; and that 
involves a contradiction. If subjective to finite beings, 
we have: first, an infinite subjectivity of finite subjects; 
secondly, the subjectivity of finite beings conditioning 
inorganic objective existence — for example, the subjec- 
tivity of the inhabitants of the Alpine region condition- 
ing the objective existence of the Alps; thirdly, the 
subjectivity of organic beings conditioning the objective 
existence of other organic beings — for instance, the sub- 
jectivity of men conditioning the objective existence of 
animals ; fourthly, the subjectivity of finite intelligent 
beings conditioning the objective existence of other 
finite intelligent beings ; and since action and reaction 
are necessarily implied, the subjectivity of those objec- 
tive existences thus conditioned, in turn, by their 
subjectivity, conditioning the objective existence of those 
beings, whose subjectivity conditioned their own objec- 
tive existence. In all of these cases contradiction and 
absurdity emerge. Space cannot be the subjective 
condition in finite beings of objective existence. 

If, on the other hand, space be an objective condition 
of the existence of finite beings, we have the absurdity, 
already emphasized, of an infinite objective existence 
conditioning the existence of finite beings, as its only 
office: as its only office, I say, for, according to the 
hypothesis, it is not an attribute of God. That an in- 



Space — What is It ? 505 

finite something should exist merely to condition the 
existence of finite beings, is inconceivable. 

I have thus endeavored to show the incompetency of 
the hypothesis that space is merely a condition of 
existence. 

Is space, then, merely a condition of thought ? Or, to 
broaden the statement of the question, in order to avoid 
ambiguity, is it merely a condition or form of our sub- 
jective processes, having no real objective existence 
separate from and independent of them? As Kant 
seems to me to have maintained this view, it is well to 
get, if we can, some clear apprehension of his doctrine 
on the subject. In the first place, he admits the infinity 
of space. In the second place, he holds that it contains 
all phenomenal finite existences. In the third place, he 
defined it to be an a priori form of intuition. By intui- 
tion he understood the representations impressed 
through sensation upon the perceptive faculty by exter- 
nal phenomena empirically related to it ; and he held it 
to be "the only subjective representation referring to 
something external that would be called a priori objec- 
tive." In other words, it is the only a priori subjective 
form which grounds the possibility of empirical know- 
ledge of external phenomena. In the fourth place, he 
affirmed the empirical reality of space, so far as every 
possible external experience is concerned, and at the 
same time maintained its transcendental ideality; but 
how does this bear upon the question of the separate 
and independent objective existence of space? Let him 
answer. "We maintain," he says, "that space is nothing, 
if we leave out of consideration the condition of a 



506 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

possible experience, and accept it as something on which 
things by themselves are in any way dependent." 

A writer's meaning is always liable to be miscon- 
ceived, and it becomes us to be cautious in interpreting 
this language of the great German philosopher in ex- 
pounding his doctrine of space. It might, perhaps, be 
said that, in asserting that space is not to be accepted as 
something on which things by themselves are in any way 
dependent, Kant meant that things, considered as sub- 
stantial realities, are not dependent on space; but it 
would seem clear that he was speaking of things as 
phenomenal realities — things as appearing to us through 
their phenomenal existence ; or it might be said that his 
meaning was that if things be viewed as phenomenal 
realities, although they may have an existence apart 
from their relations to our subjective form of intuition, 
yet have not their cause or ground of existence in space, 
but in something else, separate from our subjective 
process — say, for instance, in the creative and upholding 
power of Gocl. This interpretation, however, it would 
appear, is precluded by the express language, "space is 
nothing if we leave out of view the condition of a pos- 
sible experience" — that is, an experience of human 
beings. His "doctrine, so far as I am able to collect it 
from his own exposition of it, is that space is an a 'priori 
subjective form — what is equivalent to a necessary 
principle or fundamental law of the common sense 
school; and that this law, as anteceding experience, is 
elicited into expression by the empirical relation of our 
minds to external phenomena. It gives to these phe- 
nomena their form, in the sense that they would be 



Space — What is It? 507 

nothing apart from it. In a word, he denies that space 
has any objective existence independent of the a "priori 
subjective form of intuition. With this doctrine Ham- 
ilton and the common sense school are in accord, as 
against the sensational philosophy, so far as the affirma- 
tion is concerned that there is an original principle, a 
fundamental law, of our mental constitution, which 
grounds belief in space; but the common sense school 
differs with Kant in that it asserts the independent 
objective reality of space. For example, when Hamilton 
speaks of the maximum and minimum of space, and of 
its conceived divisibility, he cannot mean to refer simply 
to a native cognition, a subjective form of thought. 

Taking Kant's doctrine in regard to space, as it has 
now been represented, to deny its independent objective 
reality as an object of knowledge to us, I proceed to state 
some of the reasons which oppose its reception. 

(1.) A distinction must be made between the pictures 
of the imagination and native principles or fundamental 
laws of belief. It certainly would be illegitimate — it 
would be wild — to infer, from the grotesque combina- 
tions of once presented objects by the pictorial imagina- 
tion, that there are objective realities which answer to 
them, and which their subjective existence demands; 
but where there is a fundamental form, to use Kant's 
term, or a necessary law of belief or thought, we are 
warranted in postulating for it a corresponding objective 
reality. Not that such a reality is directly given, but 
the conditions of experience being furnished, the sub- 
jective form or law is elicited into expression, and the 
objective reality is affirmed. Take, for instance, the 



508 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

law of causality. If it be admitted to be implicitly con- 
tained in our mental constitution, there is required as 
answering to it the existence of real causes ; and when 
those empirical conditions obtain which 'bring us into 
contact with external phenomena, the observation of 
phenomenal changes occasions, in accordance with the 
subjective law, the affirmation of real, objective causes, 
which depend upon that law indeed for their knowledge, 
but not for their existence. Kant himself argued from 
the subjective existence of the fundamental concept of 
moral responsibility to the objective existence of a moral 
law, and pressed, as irresistible, the inference from it 
to a moral ruler. Why he did not consider the same 
procedure valid in the sphere of intelligence it is diffi- 
cult to see. His inconsistency in this matter has been 
frequently animadverted upon by subsequent philos- 
ophers. If our nature does not deceive us in the one 
sphere, why should it be regarded as deluding us in the 
other \ 

Given, then, the necessary subjective form of space- 
intuition, we legitimately demand for it a corresponding 
objective reality. As objective phenomenal changes, 
once observed in experience, lead to the positing of 
objective causes which have a ground of existence apart 
from our subjective processes, so the observation in 
experience of objects having spatial relations leads to 
the belief in space as an objective existence, grounded in 
something different from our mental forms. 

(2.) It is admitted by Kant that space is all- 
containing. He holds it to embrace all external phe- 
nomenal existences ; "for," he observes," first of all, we 



Space — What is It? 509 

can imagine one space only, and if we speak of many 
spaces, we mean parts only of one and the same space. 
'Nor can these parts be considered as antecedent to the 
one and all-embracing space." This view of space would 
also follow from his concession that it is infinite. E"ow 
either the all things contained in space are real or they 
are not : realities, or, as Julius Miiller would say, mere 
shine. If they be real, then — 

First. From the position that space is merely a form 
of intuition, and therefore, purely subjective, it follows 
that all things are contained in the form of intuition of 
a finite mind. The inference may be characterized as 
too ridiculous to be derived from anything Kant ever 
said ; but ridiculous or not, it is necessarily drawn from 
his doctrine as to the purely subjective nature of space ; 
and it deserves to be noticed that the acute mind of 
Fichte pushed that doctrine out to this as its logical 
result. His pure subjective idealism was the developed 
result, in his hands, of Kant's speculations. 

Secondly. What human being, it may be asked, pos- 
sesses this omnitude, this extraordinary capacity of 
embracing in his subjectivity all external phenomenal 
existences ? And what is true of one human being must 
be true of every one. The wonder multiplies in propor- 
tion to the number of these all-embracing individual 
subjectivities. Each contains all things ; so that there 
are as many phenomenal universes as there are human 
beings to contain them ; and, further, every man being 
phenomenal to every other man is contained in him, and 
besides, in all whose perceptive faculties are in relation 
to him; but, at the same time, he also includes them. 
This is a marvel of marvels. 



510 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

If the all things contained in space — that is, in the 
subjective form of intuition denominated space — be 
unreal, then — 

First. Our nature would be an engine of falsehood ; 
and Kant's philosophy an instrument of deceit; for 
assuredly the universal, and therefore necessary, con- 
viction of the race is that the external phenomenal 
existences which we perceive are realities. 

Secondly. If the things which are contained in space 
are not objective realities, we would crave to know what 
there would be, to be contained in it. It is admitted to 
be all-containing, but, on the supposition, there is 
nothing real to be contained ; and what the unreal con- 
tents of space may be it passes our ability to see; but 
they are real, says Kant, though real only to our sub- 
jective form of intuition. Well, grant it; and let us 
suppose that all human beings were dead. The universe 
of phenomenal existence would fail to continue, since 
that upon which it depended is extinct. This would be 
the idealism of Berkeley, so far as human perception is 
concerned. Nor does Kant shelter himself under the 
refuge to which the Bishop of Cloyne betook himself 
under the pressure of this inevitable difficulty — the de- 
pendence of all phenomenal things upon the perceptions 
of the Divine Being. These considerations, briefly pre- 
sented, are sufficient to stumble the hypothesis of the 
sage of Konigsberg in relation to the nature of space. 
Others may be presented, apart from the speculations 
of Kant, against the doctrine that space is a mere con- 
dition of thought. 

In the first place, space cannot be merely a condition 



Space — What is It? 511 

or f orm of thought, for we cannot conceive its annihila- 
tion. This is contended for by Kant and Hamilton, and 
is proved by every effort to form snch a conception which 
the mind can make. We may, it is said, conceive the 
annihilation of all things that are contained in space, 
but not of space itself. This is true, for if we make the 
attempt in thought to annihilate space, all that is 
attained is the removal of something called space from 
in finite vacuity; but that vacuity we are compelled to 
believe is the same thing as space. Now we are able to 
conceive the annihilation of every human being, and 
consequently the non-existence of every condition or 
form of human thought. This shows that space cannot 
be merely an element of human subjectivity. Indeed, 
it would remain if the universe of phenomena were 
blotted out of existence. It is simply out of the question 
to make it merely a condition of human thought. 

In the second place, if space be merely a condition 
of thought, it is either a purely mental and subjective 
condition or an external and objective condition. If 
purely subjective, there is, ex hypothesis no objective 
reality to which it corresponds, and it would follow that 
it cannot transcend the contents of subjectivity ; but as 
that is limited and space is admitted to be infinite, a 
contradiction ensues. If space as a condition of thought 
is external and objective, as everything external and 
objective must, in the first instance — that is, as per- 
ceived and apart from inferences — be apprehended as 
phenomenal, space is phenomenal ; and as it is infinite, 
it must be the infinite phenomenal manifestation of an 
infinite substance, and that contradicts the supposition 



512 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

immediately under consideration — namely, that space 
is merely a condition of thought, and not a mode of 
substance. It would also contradict the remoter suppo- 
sition that space, as a condition merely, is not an attri- 
bute of God. 

If it be said that its being a phenomenon does not 
guarantee a substance to which it is attached, but that 
it has an independent phenomenal reality, we would 
have an infinite phenomenal reality which is neither 
God nor an attribute of God, and that involves the sup- 
position of two infinite realities independent of each 
other, which is a contradiction. So far for the suppo- 
sition that space is a condition. 

3. Is space a substance ? 

(1.) If it be a substance, then, ex hypothesi, it is an 
infinite substance. There would, therefore, be two in- 
finite substances, God and space; but they would be 
exclusive of each other. It is a contradiction to suppose 
the co-existence of two infinite substances, for they 
would condition and limit each other, and neither, conse- 
quently, could be infinite. We are compelled to suppose 
them one and the same, or to deny the existence of one 
of them. Either they are identical or mutually exclu- 
sive. 

(2.) If space be a substance, it is either a material or 
an immaterial substance. If material, then, as it is 
admitted to be infinite, we would have an infinite ma- 
terial substance; which involves a contradiction of a 
two-fold character: first, that of a material substance 
affirmed to be infinite ; for it is certain that some matter 
is finite, and therefore no matter can be infinite; sec- 



Space — What is It? 513 

ondly, that of two infinite substances different from each 
other; for God and matter are certainly different sub- 
stances, and, on the supposition, we would have God as 
infinite, and an infinite material substance besides ; but, 
as has been shown, two infinite substances are exclusive 
of each other. 

If space be immaterial, we would have two infinite 
spiritual substances, and contradiction emerges. There 
would be two infinite spirits ; but as a spirit is a per- 
sonal intelligence, there would be two infinite personal 
intelligences ; and as personal intelligence is active, two 
infinite personal activities or infinite actors — that is, 
two infinite creators, and then two infinite rulers and 
two infinite co-existent sovereignties — all of which in- 
volves supreme contradictions. It is scarcely necessary 
further to consider the hypothesis that space is a sub- 
stance. It is one which is seldom maintained. 

4. Is space an attribute of substance? 

This is the only remaining supposition. If the others 
have been removed, we are entitled, in accordance with 
the law which governs an argument like this, to hold that 
this is established. If space be an attribute, as it is 
conceded to be infinite, it is an infinite attribute. It 
must then be regarded as the attribute of an infinite 
substance, since it is plainly contradictory to affirm an 
infinite attribute of a finite substance. As an infinite 
substance is postulated for an infinite attribute, and 
there can be and is but one infinite substance — namely, 
God — it follows that space is an attribute of the divine 
substance. 

I conclude this line of thought with the following 



514 Discussions of Philosophical Questions. 

disjunctive statement as to- the relation between God and 
space : Either he is without space, or he is within space, 
or he and space are equally immense. 

If he be without space, it is limited as contained in 
him ; but it is admitted to be infinite, nor can we resist 
the belief that it is. If so, nothing can be without its 
comprehension, and therefore God cannot be without it. 

If he be within space, he is not co-extensive with it. 
He is, therefore, limited as contained in space ; but that 
would destroy the notion of his existence as God. The 
supposition is monstrous. 

The third supposition remains true — that God and 
space are co-extensive; but as nothing can be co- 
extensive with the infinite Being but his own attributes, 
space must be regarded as one of those attributes. What 
is it, what can it be, but the immensity of the infinite 
Spirit % If so, we have in our irresistible belief in space 
one of the most obtrusive evidences of the existence of 
that infinite God in whom we live and move and have 
our being. Atheism would be self-convicted of folly, 
since it could employ no argument the thoughts and 
expression of which would not confessedly imply and 
concede the existence of space, that is, the immensity of 
God. 

To recapitulate: Either space is a relation, or a 
condition of existence, or a condition of thought, or a 
substance, or an attribute of substance. These suppo- 
sitions exhaust the possibilities in the case. If there be 
any other supposition the argument would, as disjunc- 
tive, break down. But I have not met any hypothesis 
which cannot be reduced to one or another of those 



Space — What is It? 515 

which have been signalized. Now, if space has been 
shown to be neither a relation nor a condition of exist- 
ence, nor a condition of thought, nor a substance, it mnst 
be a mode or attribute of substance — the only remaining 
supposition ; but it has been evinced to be contradictory 
and absurd to make it the mode or attribute of any other 
substance than that of God. The conclusion, conse- 
quently, is that it is a mode or attribute of God's 
substance. 

This position is not novel, for it was maintained by 
that subtle metaphysician, Dr. Samuel Clarke, and by 
Augustin long before; 1 but the reasons for it, which 
have been here given, I have not met with anywhere. 

The same line of argument may be employed, mutatis 
mutandis, to show that duration is but a term equivalent 
to the eternity of the infinite Spirit. 

1 " Let no one ask of me where God was before he created the 
world. He was himself Time. He was himself Space." Quoted by 
Dr. John Duncan, Colloquia Peripatetica, p. 138. The same view 
is maintained bv Philo, Derodon and Newton. 



OCT 181900 



